Nearly 4,000 Social Security numbers of dead Peachtree City residents impacted by data breach

PEACHTREE CITY, Ga. — An Oct. 19 city council meeting in Peachtree City revealed the social security numbers and dates of birth of thousands of dead residents had been breached.

During the meeting, council members discussed the actions of a committee to purportedly check voter rolls for inactive, deceased voters, which acted without the authorization of the city. This committee included two sitting council members, a council candidate running for office, and multiple other private citizens, according to officials.

Mayor Kim Learnard released a statement about the data breach, which contained unredacted personal information of the deceased, in a Wednesday evening social media post.

According to Learnard’s post, members of city council and a candidate for City Council Post 2, among others, had formed a committee to clean up the city’s voter registration, and “falsely claimed to be working on a City Council project” while requesting the data files of the dead residents.

Learnard said the impacted residents died between 2020 to 2023, and that as many as 4,000 families may be impacted.

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In part, the Peachtree City mayor said:

“City Council members Clint Holland and Mike King, together with City Council Post 2 candidate Suzanne Brown, and Margaret Ross, Elaine Kilgore, and Walt Handley, formed a committee intending to do a ‘Peachtree City registration list cleanup project.’ They falsely claimed to be working on a City Council project when they requested the personal data files of the deceased from the Fayette County Probate Court office in May of this year. The group was forewarned by Fayette County Elections officials that the information they were trying to obtain was protected by State law, however they ultimately succeeded in obtaining this information under the pretext of conducting City business.”

Learnard’s statement said neither the committee members nor the committee itself, was, in fact, working on city business, despite council members Holland and King using city email addresses for some of the communications involved.

A recent editorial published in the Citizen and written by Holland, cited by Learnard, claiming that the information impacted by the breach was a matter of public record was incorrect, according to the mayor.

“City Council Member Clint Holland stated in a recent editorial that this information is a matter of public record. This is false. Personal information of this nature is considered ‘vital records’ and access is restricted by state statute. Georgia OCGA 31-10-25, OCGA 50-18-70 and OCGA 50-18-72 detail security required under state law for vital records,” the mayor’s statement continued.

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Learnard’s statement closed by providing a link to residents to see if their loved ones’ data may have been compromised. The link also contained 16 documents showing communications involved in the breach, including emails from both council members Holland and King.

The mayor said the data files were now also redacted.

Peachtree City officials issued the following statement Wednesday night:

“The City of Peachtree City is aware of the situation. We can confirm that the breach of personal information did not originate from city offices. We are currently reviewing the situation to determine our next steps.”

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