Identity Theft Crisis

its alarming now a days that identity theft is starting up again. With the economy crisis that different countries are experiencing, the rise of this act has seamlessly increasing. In the recent article that Yahoo featured, there was this 28 year old man who got caught with such act and was said stole 130m credit numbers. You can click on this LINK to see the article made by DEVLIN BARRETT, Associated Press Writer Devlin Barrett, Associated Press last Mon Aug 17, 6:57 pm ET for the said identity theft.

On the other hand, i have this educational ideas from Spamlaws, which gives out an educational statistical data about identity theft and how it had been affecting the monetary and some effects of this problem. According to Spamlaws, there was as large as 10 million Americans a year are becoming victims of this identity theft. Based on the 2003 and 2004 study, this data was compiled and analyzed in the so called "The Aftermath Study" to study and deliver to the public the effects of this crime and type of this crime.Here are some information that i got from this website.

Discovery of Victimization

• 38-48% of victims find out about the identity theft within 3 months of it starting
• 9-18% of victims take 4 years or longer to discover that they are victims of identity theft

Time Involved in Being a Victim

• Victims spend from 3 to 5,840 hours repairing damage done by identity theft. This difference is due to the severity of the crime - for example a lost credit card versus the use of your social security number to become your "evil twin." The average number of hours victims spend repairing the damage caused by identity theft is 330 hours.
• 26-32% of victims spend a period of 4 to 6 months dealing with their case and 11-23% report dealing with their case for 7 months to a year.
  

Monetary Costs of Identity Theft

• 40% of business costs for individual cases of identity theft exceed $15,000. The Aberdeen Group has estimated that $221 billion a year is lost by businesses worldwide due to identity theft
• Victims lose an average of $1,820 to $14, 340 in wages dealing with their cases
• Victims spend an average of $851 to $1378 in expenses related to their case
  

Practical and Emotional Costs of Identity Theft

• 47% of victims have trouble getting credit or a loan as a result of identity theft
• 19% of victims have higher credit rates and 16% have higher insurance rates because of identity theft
• 11% of victims say identity theft has a negative impact on their abilities to get jobs
• 70% of victims have trouble getting rid of (or never get rid of) negative information in their records
• 40% of victims experience stress in their family lives as a result of displaced anger and frustration over the identity theft
• 45% of victims feel denial or disbelief
• 85% of victims anger and rage
• 45% of victims feel defiled by the identity thief
• 42% of victims feel an inability to trust people because of the identity theft
• 60% of victims feel unprotected by the police
  

Uses of Victim Information

• More than one third of victims report that identity thieves committed cheque account fraud.
• 66% of victims' personal information is used to open a new credit account in their name
• 28% of victims' personal information is used to purchase cell phone service
• 12% of victims end up having warrants issued in their name for financial crimes committed by the identity thief
  

Impostor Characteristics and Relationships to the Victim

• 43% of victims believe they know the person who stole their identity
• 14-25% of victims believe the impostor is someone who is in a business that holds their personally identifying information
• The most common reported perpetrator in cases where a child's identity is stolen is the child's parent
• 16% of identity theft victims are also victims of domestic harassment/abuse by the same perpetrator. These victims believe that the identity theft is used as another way for the abuser to continue and demonstrate his harassment and control.
  

Responsiveness to victims

• Overall, police departments seem to be the most responsive to victims of identity theft, with 58% taking down a report on the victim's first request
• 1/3 of victims have to send dispute information repeatedly to credit reporting agencies
• Only 1/5 of victims find it easy to reach someone in a credit reporting agency after receiving their credit report
• 20% of victims will have the misinformation and errors removed from their credit report after their first request for the credit reporting agency to do so
  

hope we could get a better resolution for this crime so we could always protect our personal information and not to be used for some stupid acts.