Reported by Patrick Bell

Millions of Social Security numbers are now in the hands of people who aren't supposed to have them.
    
It's a big mistake leading straight back to one of the men running for Ohio Governor. The private records were mistakenly released by the Secretary of State's office.

Voter lists are crucial to political parties. They give campaign workers an efficient way to target potential supporters. The lists usually consist of the names of registered voters, their addresses, their party affiliation, and whether that person voted in the last election.

Social security numbers aren't supposed to be revealed.

But they have been because of a mistake by Secretary of State Ken Blackwell's campaign.

"That's the problem with being a public official. Your mistakes have serious consequences," said Catherine Turcer from Ohio Citizen Action, a non-partisan political watchdog group

"This couldn't have come at a worse time for Ken Blackwell," Turcer observed.

The mistake came with Republican gubernatorial primary just a week away.

"All of us, any candidate, any human, is going to make errors. What we as voters need to weigh, 'is there a pattern?'

"And you have to think about a track record that involves releasing any private information that could be used for fraudulent purposes," said Turcer.

This is the second time this year private information has been compromised by Mr. Blackwell's office. In March, a link on the Secretary of State's website revealed
hundreds of Social Security numbers listed on public documents.

Mr. Blackwell agreed to remove those records.

But in this case, a spokesman for Blackwell insists the issue has been resolved and no one's identity is in danger of being stolen.

The spokesman went on to say this was an honest mistake and those workers have promised to send all the records -- contained on computer disks -- back to the Secretary of State's office.