Sedgwick County touts ‘more secure’ bidder registration form

Sedgwick County’s website is providing a new way for vendors to register to do business with the government.

A vendor application form was one of several forms, documents and databases taken down from the county’s website after the organization lost $566,088.90 in an e-mail phishing scam last fall.

Chief financial officer Lindsay Poe Rousseau said financial and information technology staff members worked to make a replacement system “the best possible form.”

“It’s much more secure for everyone involved,” she said at a recent county staff meeting.

The previous form was provided to both potential bidders and actual vendors that were preparing to do business with the county, Poe Rousseau said.

“Everyone would fill out the same form, and it would include banking information and all kinds of 1099 (tax) information,” she said. “That wasn’t necessarily safe for them or us.”

Poe Rousseau said the replacement bidder registration form now mainly asks for contact information “so that our potential vendors can let us know that they’re interested in doing business (and) what they’re interested in doing business with us for.”

“This just gives us some basic information,” she said. “By filling out this form, we will get you on our mailing list and send you information about bids you may be interested in.”

Once a business is a vendor on a project, the county asks for tax and banking information.

“The more sensitive information is collected in the second round after you’re a real vendor,” she said.

County Manager Michael Scholes said the previous vendor application was one of the older forms on the county website.

A vulnerabilities working group, made up of county staff members, began reviewing items on the county’s website for potential vulnerabilities to fraud.

A Georgia man is charged with wire fraud in connection with the county’s $566,088 loss. Authorities say he pretended to be an executive at Wichita construction company Cornejo & Sons to change payment information and receive money for a road project.

“They were able to get other pieces of information by phishing, trolling, looking at our website,” Scholes said.

Some commissioners, such as Richard Ranzau, are interested in adding things like PDFs of contracts, the county checkbook, the county employee directory and a list of construction projects back onto the county website.

This story was originally published April 15, 2017 at 4:08 PM with the headline "Sedgwick County touts ‘more secure’ bidder registration form."