BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 2636
Page 1
ASSEMBLY THIRD READING
AB
2636 (Linder and Dababneh)
As Amended April 12, 2016
Majority vote
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|Committee |Votes|Ayes |Noes |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
|----------------+-----+----------------------+--------------------|
|Health |19-0 |Wood, Maienschein, | |
| | |Bonilla, Burke, | |
| | |Campos, Chiu, | |
| | |Dababneh, Gomez, | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | |Roger Hernández, | |
| | |Lackey, Nazarian, | |
| | |Olsen, Patterson, | |
| | |Ridley-Thomas, | |
| | |Rodriguez, Santiago, | |
| | |Steinorth, Thurmond, | |
| | |Waldron | |
| | | | |
|----------------+-----+----------------------+--------------------|
|Privacy |11-0 |Chau, Wilk, Baker, | |
| | |Calderon, Chang, | |
| | |Cooper, Dababneh, | |
| | |Gatto, Gordon, Low, | |
| | |Olsen | |
AB 2636
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| | | | |
|----------------+-----+----------------------+--------------------|
|Appropriations |20-0 |Gonzalez, Bigelow, | |
| | |Bloom, Bonilla, | |
| | |Bonta, Calderon, | |
| | |Chang, Daly, Eggman, | |
| | |Gallagher, Eduardo | |
| | |Garcia, Roger | |
| | |Hernández, Holden, | |
| | |Jones, Obernolte, | |
| | |Quirk, Santiago, | |
| | |Wagner, Weber, Wood | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
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SUMMARY: Allows an official, if an electronic request for a
certified copy of a birth, death, or marriage record is made, to
accept an electronic acknowledgment verifying the identity of
the applicant using a remote identity proofing process, as
specified, or a notarized statement of identity, to ensure the
applicant is authorized under law to receive that record.
FISCAL EFFECT: According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee:
1)This bill is permissive, thus it does not have direct costs to
the California Department of Public Health (DPH). However,
allowing the use of an electronic option results in
significant cost pressure to DPH to establish secure
electronic verification methodology for vital records.
If DPH established online verification, it is anticipated that
two staff would be needed to manage a vendor contract and
support the information technology needs for a cost of
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$270,000 annually (Health Statistics Special Fund). Costs for
authentication would be paid by the consumer. It is worth
noting the cost to the consumer for digital authentication
would likely be significantly less than the cost of having to
provide a sworn statement from a notary.
2)Vital records fee revenue could potentially shift between the
state and counties, depending on whether and how the authority
in this bill is used.
COMMENTS: According to the author, individuals seeking vital
records in California suffer longer wait times and pay
significantly higher fees than individuals seeking records in
most other states due to outdated statutes that govern vital
records request policies. The author states that county and
local staff are significantly burdened by current policies that
dictate that a vital records request may only be partially
competed online, followed by a notarized affidavit submitted on
paper. This hybrid system of online requesting means,
practically, that a vital records request cannot be processed
without countless of hours of county staff time wasted because
staff must manually attach related documents for each individual
request as supporting documentation is submitted. The author
further asserts that California's policies are drastically out
of step with national trends to increase access to vital
government services through online technologies, as 34 other
states and 171 local jurisdictions allow for digital
authentication of vital records requests online as a standard
matter of practice.
Electronic authentication (e-authentication) is the process of
establishing confidence in user identities electronically
presented to an information system. E-authentication presents a
technical challenge when this process involves the remote
authentication of individual people over an open network (i.e.
the internet), for the purpose of electronic government and
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commerce. The National Institute of Standards and Technology,
under the United States Department of Commerce, released
guidelines in 2013 to provide technical guidance to agencies to
allow an individual to remotely authenticate his or her identity
to a federal information technology system. These guidelines
address only traditional, widely implemented methods for remote
authentication based on secrets. With these methods, the
individual whose identity is authenticated proves that he or she
knows or possesses some secret information.
The Urban Counties Caucus, cosponsor of this bill, writes in
support that counties process thousands of these types of
requests which can be very time consuming for both county staff
and consumers. This bill would provide a more user-friendly way
to get access to these records through established systems that
verify the user's identity which could provide significant cost
savings to counties and provide better customer service. The
California State Association of Counties, cosponsor of the bill,
states that updating vital records requests could also reduce
the overall cost for consumers when obtaining vital records.
The current fee for a certified copy of a birth certificate in
Los Angeles County ranges from $23 to $28, and the average
notary fee is an additional $20.
Privacy Rights Clearinghouse (PRC) opposes on the grounds that
substitution of an electronic acknowledgement for a notarized
affidavit will facilitate the ability of identity thieves and
other fraudsters to obtain vital records that can then be used
to engage in criminal acts against Californians. Vital records
contain a wealth of personal information, which if
inappropriately released to the wrong person can result in
significant privacy violations. PRC further states that any
legislation expanding the ability to obtain vital records online
must have sufficient protections in place to protect
Californians' sensitive personal information and prevent
identity theft and other fraudulent activity.
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Analysis Prepared by:
John Gilman / HEALTH / (916) 319-2097 FN:
0003292