Recently, one of my clients discovered that bankruptcy cases are made available as public record and this caused them some concern. Section 107 of the Bankruptcy Code allows anyone the right to access your case. There was a time that this meant your petition could be pulled and your social security number, bank accounts and credit card numbers could be accessed by anyone. This definitely could be a problem for petitioners.

In an attempt to address this issue, the Judicial Conference of 2002 amended the policy regarding full disclosure of personal information. Only the last four numbers of your Social Security number, credit card numbers, and bank account numbers, i.e. any of your account numbers, will be available in public records. In this way your privacy is protected.

If there are instances in which you have further concern about disclosure of your identifying information-such as with an ex-spouse or a creditor-ask your attorney to remove all but the last four digits of your account numbers in communication sent to those individuals.

If you live in Denver, Aurora, Arvada, Brighton, Broomfield, Commerce City, Englewood, Highlands Ranch, Lakewood, Lafayette, Littleton, Northglenn, Westminster, Wheat Ridge, or Golden, Colorado, please feel free to contact me with any questions. Kevin D. Heupel, Colorado Bankruptcy attorney, 303-955-7570, COBankruptcyHelp Email, free-consultation form.