Identity Thieves Drain Unemployment Benefit Funds

Makarand writes "According to a News.com.com article, the defrauding of state government unemployment benefit programs is the most underpublicized identity theft crime and the states are not doing much about it. Identity thieves are using stolen social security numbers to file false unemployment claims and collecting benefits because the states have no systems in place to deter fraud. In fact, it is easier to convert stolen identity data into money by filing false unemployment claims than going after the credit card companies." From the article: "File a false unemployment claim and you can receive $400 per week for 26 weeks. Do it for 100 Social Security numbers and you've made a quick $1.04 million. It's tough to make crime pay much better than that."

Comments

Identity Fraud != Theft

[timmyf2371]

It bugs me how often identity fraud is incorrectly called theft and fraudsters are all too often are called identity thieves.

True identity theft would require the actual stealing of someone's identity. In the case of fraud, the person whose SSN has been copied still has his SSN, they have not lost anything. Same with any other copying of personal data.

Re:Identity Fraud != Theft

[hacksoncode]

Good idea. Perhaps we should call it "identity copyright infringement", because that's all it really is, right?

But, no, this is Slashdot, and that phrasing would tend to make people think that unauthorized copying of music is wrong...