It's a piece of cake for someone to steal your identity. And if they do, you can count on spending countless hours dealing with police, credit bureaus, and banks to "prove" you didn't cause the fraud.
You might even face arrest if police believe that you, rather than the actual identity thief, is perpetrating a fraud against a credit card company, merchant, or bank.
All that person needs to do is to get hold of your Social Security number, or a similar identifying number such as your driver's license number or military ID. Armed with this data, an identity thief can find your name, birthday, and other identifying information. That's enough for the thief to apply for a credit card and start making purchases using your identity.
If your personal data was well guarded by those who maintain it, identity theft wouldn't be so easy. But, it's not. For instance, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported in 2006 that state agencies in 41 states and the District of Columbia display SSNs in at least one type of public record. Most often, they appear in state and local court files and local property-ownership records.
Increasingly, these records are also placed on the Internet. And, not surprisingly, research has found that identity thieves regularly visit these Web sites to harvest SSNs.
At the same time, merchants and government agencies that demand personal identifying data don't bother to safeguard it.
For instance, beginning in 2006, hackers managed to steal nearly 100 million customer records from retail giant TJX, the owner of T.J.Maxx, Marshalls and Bob's Stores. The hackers gained access through a poorly secured wireless network that managed the cash registers and terminals. Fraud losses to banks and other institutions that issued credit cards to identity thieves who harvested TJX data is now approaching US$100 million, and it's still climbing.
As for the government "safeguarding" your identifying data, we need go no further than the Veteran's Administration, which uses the SSN as its default ID number for millions of soldiers and patients in its hospital network. In 2006, a VA contractor took home computer disks containing personal records on more than 26.5 million current and former members of the U.S. military. Thieves broke into his home and stole the disks. None of the data was encrypted.
The results are grim. In 2005, security breaches exposed more than 55 million Americans to identity theft. By 2007, that number more than doubled: last year, 128 million people in the United States had personal data exposed, according to research from the Identity Theft Resource Center.
Identity theft is a plague, and it's spreading. However, you don't need to wait to be a victim. Tomorrow, I'll reveal the single most important precaution you can take to prevent identity theft, along with suggestions about what to do if you've been a victim of this fast-growing crime.
Copyright © 2008 by Mark Nestmann
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