The exposure follows the failure to redact sensitive information from land records and other public documents posted on the Internet and makes county Web sites a veritable treasure trove of information for identity thieves and other criminals, according to a number of privacy advocates.

"These sites are just spoon feeding criminals the information they need," said B.J. Ostergren, a privacy advocate based in Richmond, Va. "But no one appears to be seeing it and nobody's changing the laws," she said.

Among the pieces of personally identifiable information made available from county Web sites by Ostergren and other privacy advocates were: U.S. Rep. Tom Delay's Social Security number on a tax lien document; the Social Security numbers for Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and his wife on a quit claim deed from 1999; drivers' license numbers, addresses, vehicle registration information, height, weight and eye color of individuals arrested for traffic violations; names and dates of birth of minors from final divorce decrees and family court documents; and even complete copies of death certificates with Social Security numbers, dates of birth and cause of death. (The Social Security numbers for Bush and his wife have been redacted and are no longer available online.)

"All of this information is available to anyone sitting in a cafe in Nigeria or anywhere else in the world," said David Bloys, a retired private investigator who publishes a newsletter called News for Public Officials in Shallowater, Texas. "It's a real security threat."

Those concerns follow news that personally identifiable information belonging to an unknown number of current and former residents of Florida are available online because sensitive information has not been removed from public records posted on county Web sites in that state.