The information explosion of the 1990s has given crooks access all sorts of personal information about potential victims. A driver's license number, credit card number, or Social Security number truly are our "identity" — numbers that define us and are they keys to various doors in the world. A credit card account reveals all of our charges and, more importantly, the types and frequencies of our purchases. A driver's license, once intended as nothing other than a permit to get behind the wheel of a car, has become, Margaret Mannix points out, "the nation's de facto ID card." A Social Security number can be an ID number in a medical file, a financial account or a student ID. Swipe this number and a few other key pieces of information, and a thief can set up a whole new life (and credit history).
"It's too easy to commit identity fraud," says Allan Trosclair, executive director of the Coalition for the Prevention of Economic Crime. Personal information can come from many places. The Federal Trade Commission estimates that more than half of all identity thefts result from compromised business records. An employee, employer, janitor, or temp worker will steal information from a personnel file, a doctor's record, retailer database, or job application. In 1997, a woman who sometimes worked for Ericsson, the electronics company, and Perrier, passed personal data on coworkers to an accomplice. He siphoned $700,000 from victims' E*Trade stock accounts and took cash advances of $800,000 on 60 credit cards. A minimum-wage hospital worker passed on Social Security numbers for newborns to an accomplice (hospitals now help new parents get Social Security numbers for babies). In December 2000, a hacker stole 60,000 credit card numbers from Creditcards.com and tried to extort $100,000 from the company. When the company refused, the hacker posted the card numbers on the Internet. Some fraudulent activity was later reported on the cards. In one well publicized case in 2001, a New York busboy was caught with the Social Security numbers and birth dates of 217 of Forbes 400 Richest Americans.
Estimated losses from identity theft, according to the Secret Service:
Connie Crowther of Coral Gables, Florida, who was robbed and then had her identity assumed by crooks, expresses the sentiments of many victims of identity fraud: "A snot nosed hooligan mugged me and robbed me in front of my own house. Now someone out there pretends they are me. They are masquerading as me and having a go at trying to be me. They want expensive stuff and expect me to pay for it."
In a Federal Trade Commission report, 19% of all victims of identity theft had some relationship with the thief: neighbor, employer or employee, roommate or family member. Six percent of identity thefts were by family members in 2001, up from 4.4% in 2000. While it appears to be growing segment of identity theft, it is difficult to measure for one obvious reason: people are often unwilling to turn a family member in to the authorities. The growth is also fueled by the ease with which a person can access personal information about a family member. Curiously, those who commit identity theft against family members rack up larger charges than those acting against strangers, according to Mr. Vonder Heide of Technology Briefing Centers. "It's usually in the $10,000 to $50,000 range. With a family member, they are going to get as much as they can."
In many cases, information is rather thoughtlessly handed out. In April 2001, the city of Biloxi, Mississippi sent out nearly 25,000 voter-identification cards imprinted with Social Security numbers, birth dates, and addresses — a wealth of personal information waiting to be seized by a thief. The IRS stopped printing Social Security numbers on mailing labels in1999 "over privacy concerns" according to IRS spokeswoman Emma Moore. The numbers are still printed on tax-return checks, however. Some have argued more safeguards should be in place in important computer systems. In April 2002, hackers broke into government computers in California and gained access to nearly every one of the Social Security numbers of the 265,000 people on the payroll. The accounts did not have addresses or credit card numbers to match with the names. But there are roughly a dozen sites on the Internet where one can use a Social Security number to search for addresses, maiden names, aliases, and other information. Setting up a new identity would take some work, but it could be done.
The average identity thief steals $17,000 from his victim and serves a minor jail sentence. John Foley, director of consumer/victim services at Identity Theft Resources, points out that the average armed robbery netted $3,500 with a 7 to 10 year sentence. "Judges still look at identity fraud as a white collar crime" (Gillin).
Identity theft did not really become a crime until 1998. Pre-1998 law prohibited the use of false identification documents, but it was not a crime to simply uses someone else's name, Social Security number, date of birth, or other identifying information. "Law enforcement must wait for an overt fraudulent act or creation of a fraudulent document before it can intercede in a case solely involving identity fraud," said James Bauer, deputy assistant director of the Secret Service told Congress in 1998 (Davis). The new legislation is called the Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act and makes identity theft a federal crime punishable by up to 15 years in prison.
Sources: Mannix, Margaret. "Stolen Names, Stolen Lives." U.S. News & World Report, November 12, 2001, p. 40; Lim, Paul J. "Sounding an Identity Theft Alarm." U.S. News & World Report, April 23, 2001, p. 74; "Identity Theft Nightmare Grows ." South Florida Business Journal, April 27, 2001, A1; "Identity Theft by Family Members Rises, Creates Greater Financial Problems."; "On-line Hackers, Insecure Government Data Open Door to Identity Theft," and "Identity Theft Growing Quickly, Many Push for More Privacy." all from Knight-Ridder/Tribune Business News; Gillin, Eric. "Protecting Yourself Against Identity Theft." Retrieved from http://www.thestreet.com; Federal Trade Commission. Identity Theft Clearinghouse, Identity Theft Complaint Data: Figures and Trends on Identity Theft January 2000 through December 2000.
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