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Identity Theft Research Paper

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Introduction Every day as you enter information online or over the phone. You should wonder about where this information goes who could intercept it and what they can do with it. Identity theft is something that happens often, mostly due to a careless individual with his or her personal information. A lot of people think that it could never happen to them and that they don’t make enough money to become a target, but the truth is you can and it will happen to you unless you take certain steps to protect yourself and your information when using the internet or talking on the phone. What is identity theft?
Identity theft is when someone you may have never met or maybe someone you know that has been keeping an eye on you waiting to steal your …show more content…

A quote by Sara scorcher states “Victims rarely know anything about their predators. Yet the thieves know everything about them” (scorcher).

What are the types of identity thief? There are eight types of identity theft. Financial which is data breaches, in which the thieves hacked a company and obtained tons of consumer records. There is insurance which is classified as a new type, it must be addressed independently than other types of identity theft. Medical identity theft which is said to be the most dangerous and hardest to fix. As stated by the world health organization. “Medical identity theft the information crime that can kill you.” (World health) Medical identity theft occurs when someone uses a person’s name and sometimes other parts of their identity — such as insurance information — without the person’s knowledge or consent to obtain medical services or goods, or uses the person’s identity information to make false claims for medical services or goods. Medical identity theft frequently results in erroneous entries being put into …show more content…

Sampson “A first-ever review of Secret Service files has found that only half of the cases of identity theft involved technological devices, such as computers, scanners and digital cameras, and only 10 percent were done exclusively through the Internet.” (Sampson) in a recent study Researchers from Utica College's Center for Identity Management and Information Protection in New York analyzed 517 closed Secret Service cases of ID theft from 2000 to 2006. It was the first study of such files from the federal agency, which is responsible for investigating identity theft and fraud. Among their findings a fifth of the time the thieves stole personal data from the workplace. Of them 60 percent worked in retail, car dealerships, gas stations, casinos, restaurants, hotels, hospitals and doctor offices. 22 percent worked for financial services, such as banks and credit card companies, and 9 percent where in the government. (Sampson) there are many ways that thieves obtain your personal information, most common is you giving it to them yourself, or miss placing documents with the information on it. Anything with your date of birth, social security number, name, and address on it, is the Holy Grail to an identity thief. Most online thief happens under false pretenses called phishing which is phony emails claiming you have a distant relative that has passed away and has left you a huge sum of money, this email will then ask you to send some type of check or proof

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