Watch Out for Thefts Like These
Here’s a sample of the way identity thieves commit their crimes:
- File a change of address form in your name to
divert mail and gather personal and financial
data
- Steal credit card payments and other outgoing
mail from private, curbside mailboxes
- Lift driver’s license numbers, Social Security
numbers, phone numbers, or other identifiers
from checks
- Steal mail, especially envelopes containing bill
payments, from unlocked, unguarded, “out
boxes” at work
- Go “dumpster diving” by digging through
garbage cans or communal dumpsters in search
of cancelled checks, credit card and bank statements,
or preapproved credit card offers
- Steal discarded applications for preapproved
credit cards and fill them out with a different
address
- Steal wallets and purses—and all the credit and
identification cards inside them
- Take important documents such as birth certificates,
passports, copies of tax returns and the
like during a burglary of your house
- Steal Social Security cards
- Steal the Social Security numbers and identities
of children who are especially vulnerable
because they don’t have credit histories
and it may be many years before the theft is
discovered
- Lift names and Social Security numbers
from such documents as a driver’s license,
employee badge, student ID card, check, or
medical chart
- Use personal information from a Who’s
Who book or a newspaper article
- Use the personal information of a relative or
someone he or she knows well, perhaps by
being a frequent visitor to their home
- Pretend to be government officials or legitimate
business people who need to gather
personal information from credit reporting
agencies or other sources
- Hack into a computer that contains your
personal records and steal the data
- Buy records stolen by a fellow employee
who’s been bribed
- “Shoulder surf” by watching from a nearby
location as he or she punches in a telephone
calling card number or listens in on a conversation
in which the victim provides a
credit card number over the telephone in a
public place
- Use the camera in a cell phone to photograph
someone’s credit card or ATM card while he or
she is using an ATM machine or buying something
in a store
- “Phish” by sending a legitimate-looking email
that directs you to a phony website that looks
legitimate and asks for your personal and
financial data
- “Pharm,” a tactic by which criminals “hijack”
whole domains to their own sites and gather
the personal and financial data of users who
believe they’re communicating through their
customary service provider
- Send fraudulent spam emails that promise
huge prizes or bargains in return for personal
and financial information
- “Skim,” in which a dishonest merchant
secretly copies the magnetic strip on the
back of your credit or debit card in order to
make a counterfeit card that can then be
sold
- Send a fake electronic IRS form to gather
personal information and financial data
(Note: The IRS never requests information by email.)
