Crime of Identity Theft Needs to be Taken More Seriously

Published June 18, 2001, The Post-Tribune

I held open an elevator door in a courthouse as a young woman scurried aboard and courteously thanked me. When we exited the elevator together and headed to the same courtroom, I realized that she was the person who is charged with 21 counts of fraud police believe she committed against me.

I could empathize with the accused perpetrator, a 23 year-old from a tough inner-city Philadelphia neighborhood with no adult criminal record. According to her confession, friends convinced her to try making a fast buck by stealing social security numbers (SSNs) and applying for credit cards in other peoples' names.

An employee of the university I attended, police say she obtained a list of students named Jones-a plain vanilla name-from a university database. My name topped the list, along with my SSN and birthdate. Armed with just these three pieces of information, she began opening credit accounts with her address but my name and credit history, eventually charging $1140.

I might not have discovered the crime for months. But by a stroke of luck, the imposter applied for a credit card with a bank that issues one of my cards. Since I appeared to have two different addresses, the issuing bank called wondering if I wanted to file a change of address!

University police caught the imposter after only two months of painstaking investigation. As few as 1% of identity theft cases are ever resolved, and most take many months. Complicated questions of jurisdiction can cause many police departments to refuse even to take a report of identity theft.

Now I cannot obtain instant credit, I have to personally re-verify all credit applications made in my name, and my favorite department store has to request extra ID and call headquarters when I use my store card-more than a little embarrassing.

But I am just one of over 100,000 Americans who are victimized annually by identity theft, crime's nouvelle vague. With federal prisons clogged by the likes of innocuous pot smokers under mandatory minimum sentences, committing a mere 21 counts of fraud often earns only probation-despite victims' emotional scars and the relative difficulty of catching ID thieves.

Once an imposter knows another's social security number and birthdate, he can use the victim's name and credit history to obtain credit cards and auto loans, gain employment, file bankruptcy, and drain retirement accounts. The imposter's unpaid bills can obliterate the victim's creditworthiness.

Identity theft could happen to anyone, even students like me who have little income and even less credit history. I double-lock my apartment's door to protect my replaceable material goods, but I never took steps to protect my irreplaceable identity.

Our personal information is easily obtainable. It is therefore incumbent on individuals to protect their private information from identity pirates.

Indeed, we cannot be absolutely sure institutions will safeguard the data they keep. For instance, the university I attended has actually had several recent cases of identity theft but still did not remove SSNs from its student record database because a key administrator baulked.

Accordingly, the SSN should never be divulged except when required by law. Employers and schools cannot force employees and students to allow them to use the SSN except for reporting income to Uncle Sam.

Also, documents containing the SSN should be safeguarded and shredded upon disposal, as thieves have rummaged for SSNs in dumpsters.

Applying for credit in store lobbies, concert venues, and auto shows is risky because the paper application allows anyone who sees it to copy your information. In contrast, well-known banks' websites are actually extremely safe ways to apply for credit.

Information should never be disclosed by phone unless you have initiated the call and are sure who is on the other end of the line. In one recent case, an imposter called claimed to be a police detective investigating identity theft and requested people to "verify" his records by providing their SSNs.

Credit reporting agency Equifax has created an online "Credit Watch" service that quickly notifies subscribers of changes in their credit files so that unexpected changes can be examined immediately. For more ways to protect oneself, visit <www.consumer.gov/idtheft>.

One can never fully protect oneself from identity theft, and a certain level of trust is necessary to conduct one's daily life. Simply being aware of when one releases personal information goes a long way toward preventing being victimized.

Reader-Columnist Adrian Jones of Valparaiso graduated this spring from the University of Pennsylvania. He starts a consulting job in Chicago in August.