Because an individual defending himself against civil AND criminal proceedings will get very expensive very fast. In addition, any competitor would be very cautious about touching that data if the guy approaches them trying to sell it, because see figure (1).
So the only avenue remaining is selling the PII to spammers and identity thieves, which will still land him at figure (1) if they get caught and roll over.
Because an individual defending himself against civil AND criminal proceedings will get very expensive very fast. In addition, any competitor would be very cautious about touching that data if the guy approaches them trying to sell it, because see figure (1).
So the only avenue remaining is selling the PII to spammers and identity thieves, which will still land him at figure (1) if they get caught and roll over.