Choicepoint Pays Surprisingly Small Settlement

ChoicePoint, which made headlines last year by paying $15 million in fines to the FTC as a result of an unauthorized release of consumer data, has settled lawsuits stemming from the same incidents with 44 states. The price, according to this article from CNET is...$500,000. Apparently, once the breach wasn't in the headlines, ChoicePoint felt that multimillion dollar settlements were no longer worth the money. Surprisingly, the states agreed, and ChoicePoint got off with payments of about $3.50/affected consumer in state fines.