Preventing identity theft: New legal obligations for businesses
✍ Scribed by Richard Haygood; Robert Hensley
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 2006
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 142 KB
- Volume
- 33
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0745-7790
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
According to the National Crime Prevention Council, identity theft is the fastest growing crime in America. 1 Identity theft is broadly defined as any crime in which someone wrongfully obtains and uses another's name, Social Security number, credit card number, or other personal identifying information, usually for economic gain. In 2005, the Federal Trade Commission reported 255,565 official consumer reports of identity theft. The Better Business Bureau estimates that around 9 million Americans have experienced the unauthorized use of their personal information. 2 The number of those actually affected is likely much greater, since many incidents go unreported or undetected.
The media has focused on what seems to be a weekly parade of high-profile information thefts. News that a computer belonging to an employee at the Department of Veterans Affairs was stolen, potentially compromising the personal information of more than 26 million veterans, occupied the headlines for days. A Texas student loan provider also made national headlines when approximately 1.3 million borrowers were put at risk after a contractor lost computer equipment containing the borrowers' names and Social Security numbers.
Not surprisingly, both the federal government and state legislatures have enacted an array of laws in an attempt to address this issue. At present, all 50 states have laws making identity theft a crime, and at least 23 have imposed new requirements on businesses and institutions in an effort to protect the personal information of consumers and employees. Because even the smallest organization will acquire and use the personal information of its employees, clients, or customers in the regular course of business, these new laws will affect almost every business.