| The Truth About Identity Theft A Special Report |
Due to the lack of formal education the majority of individuals have been manipulated
into believing that identity theft is strictly a financial crime when in fact it is not. Based
on the Federal Trade Commissions most recent statistics financial identity theft
represents less than 28% of what was reported during the year 2006.
There are actually five areas of identity theft that consumers need to be made aware of.
The five areas of identity theft are Driver License. Social Security, Medical,
Character/Criminal, and Financial. Drivers License Identity Theft is where thieves copy
your drivers license and commit motor vehicle violations in your name (DUI, speeding,
reckless endangerment). This form of identity theft could have your license suspended,
could make your insurance rates go thru the roof, or could get your arrested on a warrant
and transferred to a different state for failing to appear to a court date that you had
nothing to do with. Social Security Identity Theft is when thieves use your social security
number to work and leave you with the tax bill. You could be audited by the IRS for tax
evasion, have your tax refund confiscated or even be arrested all because of a felon,
terrorist, or illegal immigrant is or was working under your social security number. Then
there is Medical Identity Theft which the World Privacy Forum refers to as "The
Information Crime That Can Kill You". Medical Identity Theft is when someone uses
your information to get medical treatment. The major threat to this is that their medical
records become your medical records and if they have a different blood type or medical
condition that collides with yours then it could cause you to be provided something life
threatening or denied something lifesaving because they will assume that the thieves
information is actually yours. Criminal Identity Theft is when thieves commit crimes in
your name. This is actually the second highest reported type of identity theft. This form
of identity theft could have your terminated from or denied employment, it could have
you arrested and transported to another state. Once criminal arrests are placed on your
record they are never removed. Imagine trying to work around children or help out at
your church with recent arrests on your record for prostitution or drug trafficking. Then
there is Financial Identity Theft, the most talked about aspect of the crime. I'll summarize
it by saying this, if someone creates a debt in your name and you don't dispute it within
60 days, YOU OWE THE MONEY. This is due to a lot of new law changes that have
recently gone into effect. For more info on this go to www.consumer.gov/idtheft or
www.kj3rd.com and download a copy of the FTC guide "Taking Charge Fighting Back
Against Identity Theft". Once you read the FTC guide you will discover why our lives
are forever changed and why on average it takes 60 to 600 for individuals to get their life
back once it's stolen as well as the absolute need to have counsel on a national basis. These are the five basic
areas of identity theft and this is why it's about more than just your credit.
When you realize that 80% of the problem is not credit related it becomes obvious that
although credit monitoring is important, by itself it is almost useless.
Now that we actually know what identity theft is let’s explore how it takes place which is
another misconception. Even though identity theft can take place by someone copying
your information off of an online purchase or stealing your mail out of your mailbox, the
majority of public identities are made available due to security compromises (lost
laptops or data breaches). When I first began tracking data breaches two years ago we as
a nation had lost the information on over fifty million Americans within a six month
period. When I looked at the statistics just a few hours ago I realized over the past twenty
months we as a nation have compromised the private data of over 159 million people
(http://www.privacyrights.org/ar/ChronDataBreaches.htm ), or over half of our
population. The rapidly growing number of data breaches we have experienced as a
nation has caused our lives to be forever changed. The likelihood of someone being a
victim of identity theft now really has nothing to do with what they do; it is 80 to 90%
dependent upon the security practices of the companies we do business with. This as well
as the level of complacency amongst business owners to beef up security measure and
properly train their staff on the importance of data protection has lead to two things. The
first is for the Federal Trade Commission to say that more people will be victims of
identity theft than not over the next twelve months. The second is that Congress and
individual states have passed a series of laws that place absolute liability on businesses
and individuals for the way they handle data including who they allow access to it, the
ways they store, process, maintain, and collect it. These new laws sound like alphabet
soup with names like F.A.C.T.A, H.I.P.A.A., & GLB Safeguard Rule but the effect is
very threatening to business owners with fines from $2500.00 to $1,000,000.00 per
instance per occurrence, class action lawsuits with no statutory limitation, and
responsibility for actual damages. These laws are in response to what the Alberta
Business Journal refers to as “A New Breed of Criminal …They’re not after your
money, your equipment, or your inventory. A new breed of criminal wants the
personal information you keep on customers, suppliers and employees. And if you
lose it, you’ll wish they went for the cash.”. Market Watch has said that “Identity
thieves are increasingly finding their jackpot is not in your mailbox or kitchen trash
bag, but the computer files stored at your chiropractor, accountant or doctor … the
future is not burglaries of your home, but of dentists, CPA’s, insurers ...etc”.
Consumers need to understand this because they need to be made aware that the
security practices of businesses they do business with could dramatically impact their
lives either positively or negatively. Consumers need to also understand that businesses
can be held liable for the situations they are subjected to. As consumers become more
educated and begin confronting business owners then the business owners will begin to
be forced to protect data.
The third point that consumers need to be made aware of are companies that pop up overnight and claim to
provide identity theft protection. There are essentially four types of identity theft protection policies in the
marketplace. I think that it is critical for
consumers to understand the policies that are in the market in order to understand what
they do and don’t do. This is crucial in order for individuals to not be manipulated and
taken advantage of by people who want to profit off of their misfortune. The four types of
policies are Reimbursement, Resolution, Monitoring, and Restoration. Reimbursement
policies are the most threatening manipulation tool in the market. This type of policy
doesn’t reimburse the victim for the money they lost it reimburses them for the money
they put out of pocket to get back the money they lost. This is scary because it only
addresses the financial side of identity theft. The second danger of this policy is that if
you dispute the debt after 60 days then the underwriter might not even reimburse your
expenses based on the fact that under the law you may legally owe the money. The
second manipulative policy is called a resolution policy. This type of coverage preys on
the consumer’s ignorance. The policy is written something like this” When you’re a
victim of identity theft we will give you twelve months of credit monitoring and access to
our knowledgeable customer service reps.”. The biggest threat of this type of policy can
be found in the first word (When), there is nothing proactive about the policy at all. The
second threat is the fact that the FTC says you won’t realize how you’ve been victimized
until 24 to 36 months later, so 12 months of credit monitoring runs out 12 to 24 months
before you actually need it. Then there is what I call 1-800-India (not making fun of
anybody’s ethnicity it’s just where I think the number is forwarded to). Again this is a
policy that doesn’t provide any type of protection except for financial identity theft. The
best thing that you can have even though it isn’t good enough by itself is monitoring. The
way I would explain it would say” imagine your phone rings and it’s the fire department
and they say we just wanted to let you know your house is burning down and then they
hung up.” Or you’re on your way home and you turn on your street and you see a U-Haul
truck at your door, and you see people carrying out your refrigerator, you call 911 and
say “I’m being robbed” they say “we know we’ve been monitoring them”. The problem
is no one ever said they would help they just said they would tell you. The forth type of
policy is the second best thing you could have but again not enough by itself. The forth
type of policy is full restoration, this is when professionals help you get your life back.
As a Certified Identity Theft Risk Management Specialist for The National Fraud
Institute ( www.tifrm.net ) I don’t feel comfortable recommending any one company to
protect an individual. The threat is two diverse in order to trust ones life to just one
company. The only product I am comfortable recommending is provided through a joint
marketing agreement through two 30 year old stock exchange companies. Kroll
Worldwide and Prepaid legal services are the only two companies that have the ability to
provide protection in every area of identity theft before during and after the incident takes
place. The relationship was created by Kroll, having the reputation of being the largest
risk consulting firm in the world, they went to Prepaid Legal Services because they knew
that 80% of the problem would require individuals to have access to attorneys. Through a
joint marketing agreement individuals can have access to Kroll investigators (80 to 90%
are former FBI, Secret Service, & CIA agents) and Prepaid Legal Attorneys (90% of
which are Martindale Hubbard AV rated ... the highest rating possible for attorneys as
recognized by the American Bar Association www.martindale.com). These companies
provide a layered system of protection with Kroll doing the monitoring and full
restoration and the PrePaid attorneys taking and making phone calls, writing letters,
reviewing documents, providing trial defense, and 24 hour 7 day a week 365 day a year
access to counsel in an emergency situations. The Prepaid portion of the membership can
be used for much more than identity theft with additional areas of coverage such as will
preparation , and motor vehicle traffic defense, IRS audit protection and much more.
Both companies are industry leaders with over 30 years experience in their prospective
fields and it’s taken each one that much time to develop the infrastructure to be able to
protect individuals adequately and even then there still had to be a joint marketing
agreement.
These companies went so far as to invest over a million dollars to develop compliance
program that would assist businesses with understanding the new laws, developing a
written policy, training their staff on following that policy and appointing a security
officer to make sure that the staff follows it. The compliance program fulfills everything
that Betsy Broder the Director of Privacy for the FTC was quoted in her American Bar
Association article as saying businesses must have “…..all business should look to that
law for guidance on how to protect consumer data. At a basic level, she says, that means
businesses need to have a plan in writing describing how customer data is to be
secured and an officer on staff responsible for implementing that plan.” in the same
article she went on to say ““We will act against businesses that fail to protect their
data … She understands that most small businesses cannot be expected to hire a full
time privacy specialist but adds that all businesses must be able to show they have a
security plan in place. “We’re not looking for a perfect system … But we need to see
that you’ve taken reasonable steps to protect your customers’ information”. Now
most companies after developing a compliance program such as this and having had it
refined by former attorney generals and a white paper drafted by the same law firm that
represents the United States Chamber of Commerce would charge an arm and a leg. These companies are
giving this program away to companies on a national level. I established a deep respect for the founder of
Prepaid Legal years ago when I witnessed him state in front of thousands of people “I hope I don’t offend anyone
but if I do I make no apologies. This may be a company but its first a good old Christian crusade.” The policy that
these companies provide businesses is a Sarbanes Oxley compliant policy that cost well over one million dollars.
The training that I am allowed to provide to staff members of the companies enrolled as a CITRMS would cost the
company anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars per employee and now I can do it for free.
Before there were companies who did value the data that they keep on people and really wanted to do the right
thing but the problem were that the cost of becoming compliant was too great for them to be able to. Now any
company who wants help protecting their data and ultimately lowering their liability and mitigating their damages
can get that help at no cost. I love the company and what its doing.
Identity theft is the fastest growing crime in human existence. It is the number one source of fundraising for
terrorist and organized crime. The thieves don’t rob banks any more, one out of seven bank robbers gets away
as opposed to one out of seven hundred identity thieves who even get arrested. It’s predicted to cost consumers
over 56 billion dollars so far. Please be reminded that when the 911 attacks were investigated 9 of the individuals
involved where using fake passports and their tickets were purchased using stole card numbers. Ladies and
gentlemen our lives are forever changed and the public needs to be made aware of this horrible problem. The
biggest issue we have is lack of proper education. There is someone who needs to understand what you have
read so I urge you to forward this information email to as many people as you can. If you would like more
information or if you have any questions feel free to email me directly at
kj3rd@kj3rd.com. Don’t forget to visit www.kj3rd.com and sign up for my newsletter so
that we can keep you informed. I feel very strongly in the protection of our people and
feel that it is a very major part of my ministry. If you know of any group that needs to
have this information presented or needs to be educated on this topic then contact my office directly. The Lord
has truly blessed me to be in a position to teach, inform and protect so many people. I ask that if you do nothing
more that you pray for me.
May the Lord Bless and Keep You Is My Prayer.
K.J. Anderson III, C.I.T.R.M.S.
404-474-2273
www.KJ3rd.com
www.tifrm.net
www.gosmallbiz.com
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