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Bill Introduced to Congress Would Allow ID Theft Restitution
verybadradio writes with an article at News.com about a bill introduced into Congress that would allow citizens who have been victimized by identity theft to seek repayment for the money and time spent repairing their credit history. The bill was introduced by Democrat Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Republican Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. "Last year, 8.4 million Americans were victims of identity theft, and many were left with a bad credit report, which takes months or years to repair, the lawmakers said ... The bill would also eliminate a requirement that the loss resulting from damage to a victim's computer must exceed $5,000 for prosecution; make it a felony to use spyware or keyloggers to damage 10 or more computers; and expand the definition of cybercrime to include extortion schemes that threaten to damage or access confidential information on a computer."
Are you expecting Donatelli Group to tell Bush to veto?
Shiny. Let's be bad guys...
Fighting cyber-crime through legislation of the 'bad' guys is a stupid waste of resources when it can't be remotely effective. Adding legislation that increases the penalties or adds to the excessive number of laws already in place to prosecute these individuals does nothing to reduce crime. You simply turn immoral business criminal and end up with a few individuals who are unduly punished in comparison to their peers who get away scott free. I can't emphasize enough how this harms the Americans as they end up with a false sense of safety. The crimes against Americans don't stop just because a few American business criminals get caught and shut down. If it worked to shut down the American criminal element it would still not reduce the problem of American citizens being victims of identity theft. The only people to blame in many of these cases are the victims themselves given the nature of the Internet (negligent, no technical training), the banks (negligent, fail to limit damages due to lack of further authentication), and the credit industry (horrible systems to determine credit worthiness and horrible methods to authenticate once provided credit).
This is more waste of Congressional salaries. Who ya gonna sue?? Like the person who stole your ID is going to have any assets. This is just another way to line the pockets of ambulance chasers. The lawyers will get YOUR money and you get SQUAT in return. This is a joke, just like most civil suits are. You may get a judgement, but you'll never see a penny. The only people making money here are lawyers.