What is the Origin of Identity Theft?
Identity theft is a major problem in this day and age. It hurts the creditors that have money owing to them as well as the people whose identities are stolen. Even the general public looses because of the extra fees and higher interest rates charged by the companies for money they loose. It’s difficult to determine its origin but it’s really just another form of thievery and that’s been around forever.
Is Identity Theft Creative or Just Stealing?
At it’s simplest, identity theft is just a form of stealing. It can actually be traced back before the internet. A recent movie called “Catch Me If You Can” portrays the life of a conman. He lived his life as someone else of various professions often carrying out check fraud.
This movie helps to demonstrate the origin of identity theft. This form of thievery eventually developed into modern-day identity theft. Conmen and thieves have simply become better at it. Today, unscrupulous people are able to use various sources (the internet and e-mail for one) to essentially impersonate not a profession, but an individual.
One of these ways this is done is by e-mail. An e-mail containing a virus can be sent to you to gather your personal information from your computer. The best way to stop this is by not opening e-mails if you don’t recognize the sender. You need to read the information provided in the subject line and who has sent it to you.
Sometimes things can be misspelled or be obvious spam. Never open a message that you know to be spam. Keeping you virus program updated and running regularly will also help you with these unwanted messages.
Identity thieves can also do something as easy as checking the garbage that you throw out. It’s important to never throw out papers that have information on it such as social security numbers, birth dates, account numbers or any other information that pertains to identity.
It doesn’t really matter when identity theft originated. What is most important is that as individuals, we are careful with our personal information to protect ourselves against this offense.
Filed under: Security