Mass amounts of spam mail sent to University of Wisconsin System parents and students have caused an increase in complaints and confusion regarding how companies acquired the addresses.
What many do not know is that UW can legally sell student information to the public for a $90 fee.
The Wisconsin Public Records Law holds that any information available in a directory or a public domain is in turn available to the general public. For the fee, any company or organization may request any amount of public information at any time for any purpose.
“Sometimes companies will want just the e-mail addresses of all the undergraduates,” said Joanne Berg, associate vice chancellor of academic staff. “Or they might want all the home addresses of all students. It depends.”
Companies will often use the acquired information to send promotional letters or e-mails.
The real problem occurs when companies pretend to be affiliated with the university. Big envelopes may arrive at parents’ doorsteps with official-looking postmarks urging parents to send money to said companies to secure their child’s education, Berg added.
Many parents and students are also unaware they can request their personal information to be kept private.
“Students absolutely have the option of keeping their information private. They can go through the registrar’s website or the My UW website,” Berg said.
Berg added the tendency of students to ignore precautionary mass e-mails has made it difficult for the university to alert students of this option.
“We would love to hear from students about how we can tell them these things,” Berg noted. “We do send e-mails, and it’s on our website, but it’s hard to know if people are going to be interested in it or filter it at any given time. We’d love to have feedback from the students.”
According to Berg, universities make no profit from allowing companies to purchase student information lists. The fee covers only the cost of collecting the information.
Tyler Draheim, Student Association President at UW-Milwaukee, agreed this growing scam problem needs to be addressed and students need to be better informed about their rights to privacy.
“There is a button right on our website to make information private, but I don’t think enough students take advantage of that,” Draheim said. “It’s a big issue … because many students don’t even know about this.”
With the amount of complaints received by both him and the UW System, Draheim added universities should work harder to better publicize the complaints and brainstorm methods to ensure student and parent awareness.
“I know that these instances have often happened through e-mail, but this is bigger now. These letters look big and official when they come in the mail. Restrict your information,” Draheim said.
Since allowing personal information to be open the public reaps no benefits, university personnel urge parents and students to get informed about their rights to secure personal information to avoid falling victim to company scams.
CORRECTION: Due to a reporting error, the Feb 12. article “UW shares blame for mailing scam” implied that the UW charged $90 per student. The correct figure is $90 per list. Also, due to an editing error, the Feb. 12 headline “UW makes student information public for $90” may have been misleading. Both articles should have made it clear that UW is obligated by federal law to make this information available. We regret the errors.
