Identity Theft

What is identity theft?

The preliminary stage of acquiring and collecting another person’s personal information for criminal purposes is identity theft. It is one of the fastest-growing crimes of the information age.

It is a dangerous type of fraud and with the help of the internet, it is easy.  Canadian companies like Equifax and Trans Union get eighteen hundred complaints a month regarding identity theft.

The different types of identity theft

The four main types are:

Identity cloning – occurs when the accused takes on an entirely new and fake identity that has been stolen. The accused will obtain a driver’s license, passport or health card; which will be used in situations where they will need to prove their identity, usually involving criminal activities.

Financial identity theft – This is by far the most prolific form of identity theft. It is particularly hard to trace as the paper trail leads back to the victim. It happens when an individual will take funds, usually a loan or credit card.  The accused will use a genuine identity to apply for credit; this will include a name, date of birth and a valid address.

Synthetic identity theft – When an individual creates a completely new synthetic identity. The criminal will often create a completely fictitious ID using a Social Insurance Number as the basis for this, and then attempting to create a whole new record in credit files using this new identity.

Criminal identity theft – when someone is arrested and supplies identity details that are not theirs. The real owner of the ID develops a criminal record.

What is common about identity theft is that it can be applied to individuals and corporations.

Identity theft is an intrusion of the corporation and takes longer to catch than when done against an individual.

One common occurrence is where someone gets an email to submit their personal information to a bogus website.  A lot of seniors and those not sophisticated on the technology front fall prey to these emails.  They go to the website and submit their passwords and SIN and all kinds of information regarding their bank accounts.

How to protect yourself from identity theft?

You can protect yourself by:

• Never giving your personal information to anyone. If you do ask how it will be shared.
• Always check your financial statements against receipts to make sure purchases are yours.
• Protect your pin number for your ATM card at all times. Do not use easy numbers as your pin number.
• Guard your mail
• Call the credit monitoring companies and have them monitor your credit
• Id theft monitoring agencies can keep a track of your ID
• Shred documents containing your personal information.  Do not put it in the garbage.
• If you are leaving town for a while let Canada Post put your mail on hold.

Corporate identity theft can leave a great company completely bankrupt.  Criminals can now submit corporate documents to change addresses, titles, directors and all kinds of information at the registration office.  Hackers then go and open accounts under the company name and start cashing checks.

Most companies have risk management software and procedures to deal with the above.

Tips for fighting corporate identity theft are:

• Lawyers should be asking for personal ID from clients who are signing documents
• Obtain a status certificate and corporate profile
• Ensure that the person signing the documents is actually a signing officer of the corporation.
• All passwords to excel and other files are strict and changed regularly so hackers cannot find the permutations and combinations

Photo Credit: Dan Meyers Element5 Digital Clay Banks  Cody Board