“There is not a solid basis to suggest the Post-Dispatch did anything wrong. The story simply points out that government dropped the ball. It is to the public’s benefit that this information be out there to protect sensitive information,” Maneke said.
Auditor Nicole Galloway, a Democrat who was defeated by Parson in the 2020 gubernatorial election, said the onus is on government to protect its citizens.
“State agencies that collect sensitive, personally identifiable information have an obligation to carefully evaluate whether they need to collect it in the first place and then how they will protect it,” Galloway said.
In a statement, House Minority Leader Crystal Quade, D-Springfield, blasted Parson for describing the incident as a hacking.
“Instead of falsely blaming the St. Louis Post-Dispatch for a ‘hacking’ that never happened, Governor Parson should thank the paper for uncovering a serious flaw in a state website that exposed the personal information of more than 100,000 Missouri educators,” Quade said.
“The governor should direct his anger towards the failure of state government to keep its technology secure and up to date and to work to fix the problem, not threaten journalists with prosecution for uncovering those failures,” she said.
