Nearly 2,000 current and former students at Kapiolani Community College were sent letters this week warning that they could be at risk for identity theft after the recent disappearance of three boxes of documents containing private personal information including identification and credit card numbers.

KCC and University of Hawaii officials stressed, however, in a statement that “it is still unclear whether these boxes were actually stolen from the property or simply misplaced.”

KCC Chancellor Leon Richards sent letters Wednesday to 1,961 individuals who had made credit card payments for certain business transactions with the school in 2010, urging them to monitor their credit accounts and to notify officials of suspicious activity.

Individuals receiving notices included:

» Those who made requests for transcripts by mail or phone with credit card payments processed from Feb. 6 to June 30, 2010.

» Those who made credit card payments by mail or phone of nonresident application fees processed from Feb. 6 to June 30, 2010.

» Those who registered by phone, mail or fax for noncredit (continuing education) courses with credit card payment from July 1 to Nov. 3, 2010.

» Those who requested a credit card payment refund by phone, mail or fax for noncredit (continuing education) courses from July 1 to Nov. 3, 2010.

Officials said that on July 1 they learned that the boxes were missing from “a secured storage area” on the Kaimuki campus that UH officials would not identify.

The records were stored in a manner consistent with security policies, and “there was no indication of forced entry,” Richards said in his letter.

Officials at first thought the boxes had been moved by an authorized employee for official business, but that turned out to be a false lead and Honolulu police were notified July 8, Richards said. A private investigator was also hired. Both investigations are ongoing, he said.

“At this time we do not know whether or not the documents were taken for malicious purposes,” Richards said. “Nonetheless, Kapiolani Community College takes this incident seriously and is exploring a contract for credit monitoring services.”

Richards urged those who may have been affected to obtain and review credit reports, review bank and credit card statements for unusual or suspicious activity, and to contact appropriate financial institutions if they notice irregularities in a credit report or account.

UH, in its statement, said, ”Kapiolani Community College deeply regrets that these documents are missing and is doing all it can to mitigate any harm that might be inflicted as a result of this development.”

The incident was the latest in a series of security breaches at the UH system:

» In November the personal information of more than 40,000 students from the UH-Manoa and West Oahu campuses was apparently inadvertently uploaded to the Internet by a West Oahu faculty member who thought the faculty server he was using was secure.

» In July 2010 UH officials said a hacker breached the security of a parking office computer that contained personal information of 53,000 people, consisting largely of Social Security numbers and some credit card information.

» In May 2009 the records of 15,000 KCC students were compromised. The computer was on a local network where information was kept for processing financial aid. That case was closed after it was determined that no one had been harmed financially.

Last November a UH alumnus filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court against top UH officials, alleging they were responsible for a breach of confidential information.