Kudos to Rite Aid Corp., publisher Reed Elsevier PLC, and Qwest Communications for taking some steps to protect employee identity theft victims by offering various resolution services as a workplace employment benefit. Clearly the best form of protection simply requires that companies lock down private and confidential information and prevent identity theft in the first place.

Identity theft assistance offered by these companies to employees should not be considered a substitute for an employer’s responsibility to protect confidential information. Companies which do not reasonably protect sensitive information should be held accountable irrespective of whether they offer assistance to employee identity theft victims. However, providing victim assistance does seem to be a welcome recognition of identity theft problems facing our state. For that reason alone, I congratulate these companies for making identity theft victim services available to employees.