A university laptop containing past students' archived information and Social Security numbers was stolen from a faculty member while traveling earlier this month, potentially exposing 677 alumni who graduated between 1999 and 2004 to identity theft.

David Lindstrom, chief privacy officer at Penn State, declined to release the faculty member's name and said he believes the theft was random and "had nothing to do with Penn State."

"We have no reason to believe anybody's information has been compromised, but you need to take precautions, watch your credit, and just be careful," he said.

Lindstrom would not reveal the location of the theft because he said he does not "want the bad guys to know what they have."

He added that, as required by law, letters are being sent to individuals whose information was believed to be in the laptop. Annemarie Mountz, a Penn State spokeswoman, said the university has not fielded complaints from any of these people.

"It's also on the National Crime Information Center database, so every police department in the United States can try to find it," Lindstrom said of the missing computer.

Mountz said she did not know why the old information was still in the laptop, and had no new information regarding its whereabouts as of press time yesterday.

Lindstrom said the type of information stored on the stolen laptop is no longer stored on devices, but that it previously was because "that was how the university used to do business." Until 2005, students' Social Security numbers appeared on Penn State identification cards. Jim Wager, former assistant vice provost for enrollment management and registrar, said the change was made because of the explosion in Web-based commerce. "By using the Social Security number, we have compromised people's identities. We're trying as an institution to not play into this," Wager told The Daily Collegian in March 2004.

Lindstrom added that university laptops have been stolen before and have been recovered, but this is the first time this type of sensitive information has been at risk of exposure. A similar security risk occurred in July when the Social Security numbers of 8,400 Marines were posted on Penn State's Web site for 12 days when a researcher accidentally posted the information online, having received it as part of a larger file. No connected incidents of identity theft were reported.