Lorilee Woods
Future Forecast
Organized Identity Theft
A topic that the public should be concerned about in the future is the threat of identity theft as a major crime. Increasingly we are seeing people’s identities stolen and used by criminals to manipulate and exploit funds. This can be very detrimental to the victims since it can take a great deal of time, money, and heartache to overcome. Since phone, credit card companies and the like are still using individual’s social security numbers as the main identifying information, this exacerbates this problem significantly. Already we can see that identity theft crimes are frighteningly organized and complex processes. I predict that organized crime rings that specialize in identity theft will continue to expand and flourish around the world.
Background:
Organized crime is defined by the FBI as
“…those illegal acts which are characterized by deceit, concealment, or violation of trust and which are not dependent upon the application or threat of physical force or violence. These acts are committed by individuals and organizations to obtain money, property, or services; to avoid the payment or loss of money or services; or to secure personal or business advantage.” (FBI)
The main point of the definition is that they are designed to make money. Organized criminals, from Al Capone to the savings and loan scandal, want to make money.
Alarmingly, “antivirus researchers have uncovered a startling increase in organized virus- and worm-writing activity that they say is powering an underground economy specializing in identity theft and spam.” (Verton). And what better way than use the Internet to exploit a lot of money out of a lot of people. Of course this phenomenon is not a recent epidemic in crime. Identity theft has been going on for a while, but only recently has word of it reached the mainstream public’s ears. “This is a problem that not enough people really are clued into," was a quote from editorial director Richard Power with the Computer Security Institute, in San Francisco, California. (Hatcher)—even despite the popular credit card commercials and advertisements warning consumers about identity theft (CitiBank). Of course you probably don’t need any partner in crime to steal someone’s identity. All you need is to find a decently located dumpster or sufficient computer technology knowledge to hack your way in (Schwartau, 2000).
Searching around a dumpster to find individual’s account information may seem petty, but think of the damage they can do when cyber criminals band together. Not just as one or two tech-savvy criminals, but more like over 30. The Secret Service just uncovered an organized crime ring that stole about 1.7 million credit cards worldwide (Verton). And this included “28 people from eight states and six countries.” Organized crime on the Web knows no boundaries. Moreover, “Whether or not this is traditional organized crime doesn't matter -- because they are organized, and what they are doing is criminal." (Verton).
Evaluation:
But does the money that they end up stealing from people fraudulently really add up more than what corporate criminals such as in Enron or Halliburton have squeezed out?
In the organized crime scandal that the Secret Service uncovered, “financial institutions have estimated their losses associated with the suspects targeted by the investigation to be more than $4.3 million.” (Verton) Just a drop in the bucket compared with the FBI estimates of how much money is lost as a result of corporate crime:
“Health care fraud alone costs Americans $100 billion to $400 billion a year. The savings and loan fraud -- which former Attorney General Dick Thornburgh called "the biggest white collar swindle in history" -- cost us anywhere from $300 billion to $500 billion. And then you have your lesser frauds: auto repair fraud, $40 billion a year, securities fraud, $15 billion a year -- and on down the list.” (FBI)
However, other estimates have predicted larger amounts of loss from indentity theft over the Internet. In 2001, due to security breaches in corporations “the deficits totaled nearly $378 million” where in 2000, corporations said “they lost about $265 million.” (Hatcher). And furthermore, these estimates are only those that chose to report their losses from security breaches. While it is not as high as other corporate crimes, it seems to be steadily increasing. Nevertheless, organized identity theft crime should be taken as a serious issue before it gets out of hand.
We also need to take into consideration what types of people are committing and organizing these crimes. These crimes are not committed by petty criminals and hackers who don’t know what they are doing. As one man notes, "The stereotypical hacker is a juvenile with a blue mohawk and skateboard and is a genius. ... They are not where these numbers come from…these numbers come from professionals." (Hatcher). Probably the people behind the rings know what the corporate world is like and how it operates. But the anonymity that exists through the Internet makes it hard to see who is involved in these crimes and just how “organized” it is.
For the Future:
As software and technology develops, it will be easier for both criminals to organize and exploit victims and for people to put a stop to it. It seems like it will be a continuous battle between the good guys and the bad, and hopefully the more innovative ones are on our side.
But like in any other organized crime syndicates—drug cartels, mafia, Halliburton, etc.—the criminals are going to stick with where the money is. If there is easier money to be had through credit card fraud then why not go that route? It is a lot less money then having to kill people for drugs, and all you have to do is computer savvy enough to hack your way into some jackpots of security with a few of your close buddies. And you probably don’t have to meet them ever if you don’t like them.
The impact this kind of widespread criminal activity on the public should be looked at carefully though. Schwartau identified an instance where a man close to him was taken advantage by identity theft. His uncle ended up having heart complications and dieing as a result of the massive debt he suddenly had to deal with. While this is a very extreme case, it should be taken into account for the sake of what kind of mental and physical harm identity theft is liable to do to average citizens.
References:
Citibank. “2004 Fight Identity Theft.” 2004.
http://www.fightidentitytheft.com/citibank-idtheft-commercials.html
FBI. (2004) About: The financial crimes section.
Hatcher, Thurston. Survey: Costs of computer security breaches soar.
CNN.com/Sci- Tech. 12 March 2001.
http://archives.cnn.com/2001/TECH/internet/03/12/csi.fbi.hacking.report/.
Schwartau, Winn. (2000) CyberShock: Surviving hackers, phreakers, identity thieves,
internet terrorists and weapons of mass disruption. Thunder's Mountain Press:
New York.
Verton, Dan. Secret Service Busts Internet Organized Crime Ring: Feds allege 1.7
million stolen credit card numbers were involved in global scam. PCWorld.com.
29 Oct. 2004,
http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,118400,pg,1,RSS,RSS,00.asp.
Verton, Dan. Organized Crime Invades Cyberspace: Once the work of vandals, viruses
and other malware are now being launched by criminals looking for profits.
ComputerWorld. 30 Aug. 2004,
http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,95501,00.ht ml.