The documents containing the information were discovered by Betty "BJ" Ostergren a based in Hanover County, Va. For the past several years, Ostergren has been trying to get before posting them online.

A spokesman for the Secretary of State's office said the agency is working on the issue and taking steps "to protect sensitive personal information."

Speaking with Computerworld, Ostergren claimed that she has discovered hundreds of documents containing the Social Security numbers of senior executives at dozens of companies, including some large companies with instantly recognizable brand names.

The numbers are contained in images of corporate documents filed with the state of Colorado and include documents with titles such as periodic reports, amendments and name change filings.

At Ostergren's direction, Computerworld was able to easily access two such documents simply by going to the Secretary of State Mike Coffman's Web site and entering specific terms in the fields provided on the search page.