Scamlines 42: New Scams Uncovered as ID Theft Toll Soars to 10m
Real estate and identity theft cons snare more victims, state falls for $2.5m trick
Real estate and identify theft scams provide the main focus for our new round-up of the scam headlines.
We have the latest figures on the scale of ID theft in the US and news of a sneaky trick using parking tickets to try to steal people's personal details. Phony jobs are also back on the scene, again as a route to getting hold of private information.
Among our real estate stories, we have a report of a scam that used forged home ownership documents to prey on victims and a worthless circular that supposedly details a free land giveaway.
In addition, there's a new tax refund trick about, a letter that tries to get parents to pay a fee for a student aid application, and the embarrassing story of how one state handed over $2.5m to scammers.
We have the latest figures on the scale of ID theft in the US and news of a sneaky trick using parking tickets to try to steal people's personal details. Phony jobs are also back on the scene, again as a route to getting hold of private information.
Among our real estate stories, we have a report of a scam that used forged home ownership documents to prey on victims and a worthless circular that supposedly details a free land giveaway.
In addition, there's a new tax refund trick about, a letter that tries to get parents to pay a fee for a student aid application, and the embarrassing story of how one state handed over $2.5m to scammers.
The scams: Although identify theft is a very difficult thing to measure, one new study from research outfit Javelin Strategy says that ID theft claimed 9.9 million victims in the US in 2008, costing $48 billion dollars.
Crooks also speed up the time it takes from theft to cashing in on it with stolen cards and other information. 71% of incidents take place within a week, up from just 33% previously.
Fake parking tickets lead to malware download
The scam: Drivers in Grand Forks, ND, discover parking tickets on their windshields, claiming some sort of violation. The "citations" detail a website that car owners are supposed to visit for more details and to pay the fine.
At the website, victims are told they need to install a toolbar to enable the incident to be processed. In fact, it downloads a Trojan horse virus that opens the way to identity theft.
The solution: This is a new one on us. Sneaky! Even though the scam starts out in the real world of a parking lot, it still leads to an online ruse to get you to download a virus.
Security software should alert you to this malware. But, anyway, don't download and install programs from people and organizations you don't know.
The "tickets" should have been checked out with law enforcement, or property owners if they were on private property.
Identity theft is the fastest growing crime, according to the Federal Trade Commission. Experts estimate that about 10 million people become victims each year. That means every minute, 19 people become new victims of identity fraud!
In fact, according to the US Department of Justice, drug trafficking is now being replaced by identity theft as the number one crime.
If you become a victim, it will probably take you hundreds of hours and an average of $1,000 to recover from ID theft. Even worse, some innocent victims have ended up in prison because identity thieves have committed crimes in their names.
Startling Facts About Identity Theft
Identity theft is perhaps the top fraud issue, but one aspect of identity theft is very prevalent, yet is rarely discussed: when Social Security numbers are stolen, not for profit, but to get a job.
In order to get many jobs, illegal immigrants need Social Security numbers (SSNs). Since they obviously can't apply for them from the Social Security Administration (SSA), they often buy a stolen SSN and use it to get work.
For example, MSNBC reported that a legal resident in the Chicago suburbs applied for a job at a local Target department store and was not hired because someone who had used her SSN already worked there.
That was bad enough, but further investigations uncovered that her SSN had been used to obtain work by 37 other employees, mostly illegal immigrants!
This is not unusual, according to ChoicePoint: the average number of times a SSN is used for this type of immigrant-based ID theft is 30 times.
Although no one knows the extent of the problem, here are some identity theft facts according to an article by Eduardo Porter in the New York Times last year:
- About seven million illegal immigrants are currently using stolen SSNs and paying Social Security taxes.
- Their payroll tax contributions could be as high as $7 billion a year.
- Their contribution to the Social Security system added about 10% of last year's surplus.
- Illegal immigrants see Social Security withholding taxes as a cost of working in the US.
- Each year, the Social Security Administration receives a very large number of W-2 forms with incorrect and sometimes fictitious SSNs; the withholding taxes from these incorrect SSNs are put in the "Earnings Suspense File," which totals over $189 billion.
Falsely using a stolen SSN is a felony in the US, and there is no question that this is a widespread problem.
Here is an even less known fact: many of the people whose SSN are stolen are children. Since many children don't use their SSN until they turn 18 to get a job, an illegal immigrant can often use their SSN for years without getting caught.
Unfortunately, illegal immigrants also sometimes fail to make credit payments, file for bankruptcy, and harm victims' credit in other ways. When the rightful SSN owners turn 18, they can have credit history problems, which results in being unable to get student loans, jobs or other kinds of credit.
However, even if there are no direct financial consequences to the victim, this is nonetheless not a victimless crime. It can take hundreds of hours to get everything straightened out -- and there is no guarantee that the SSN won't be stolen and used again.
(source http://www.scambusters.org/identity-theft.html).
Protect yourself now.
