Having Your ID Stolen Leads to Job Loss, Prosecution

ConfusedVorlon writes "The BBC reports on the sad case of Simon Bunce. Mr. Bunce had his identity stolen, and credit cards were made to capitalize on the theft. Some of those cards were used at sites offering child pornography, and as a result Mr. Bunce was swept up in Operation Ore. The poor man was prosecuted for his 'crime', and was eventually found innocent, but in the meantime he lost his job. It took him six months to find another at a quarter of the salary. 'The police's computer technicians take several months to examine [his computers and records], and Mr Bunce could not afford to wait to repair the damage done to his reputation. "I knew there'd been a fundamental mistake made and so I had to investigate it." Recent surveys suggest that as many as one in four Britons have been affected by it. In 2007 more than 185,000 cases of identity theft were identified by Cifas, the UK's fraud prevention service, an increase of almost 8% on 2006.'"

Comments

Re:It's terrible

[Anonymous Coward]

I have personally experienced what an accusation can do to one's employability... not even a conviction, just an arrest or an accusation. Is this an acceptable part of the justice system? I don't think so. While it's important to 'care for the victims' it's EQUALLY important to protect the rights of the accused until there is enough evidence to prove something is wrong.


I was accused of aggravated battery and for 6 months I was unemployable. Though the charges were thrown out my life was ruined, my family's future and security was in question, my wife left me (wow I should write a country song) and I was treated like a leper. Thanks a lot over ambitious prosecutor, especially since I have no recourse over what you did to me for nothing.

I'm doing fine now & on top of the world career-wise. I have my pride though & those employers who were happy to hire me once the that portion of my life was over got a thanks but no thanks letter from me- I see their true colors and how they would treat someone based on a rumor and nothing more. I wont forget.

And a criminal organization with patience ...

[khasim]

Scenario: Build a database with every possible social security number.

Next, start gathering whatever information you can and entering it in that database. By theft or purchase or whatever.

How long will it be before you can, digitally, "prove" that you are any person in that database?

The attacks you are talking about are just the tip of the iceberg. It would be possible to perform such fraud on a nation-wide basis. Against just about any person in the nation.

And our system is NOT equipped to deal with such.

Re:And a criminal organization with patience ...

[Original Replica]

The attacks you are talking about are just the tip of the iceberg. It would be possible to perform such fraud on a nation-wide basis. Against just about any person in the nation.And our system is NOT equipped to deal with such.

This kind of database problem was pointed out back in 1967 in a fascinating article in Atlantic magazine.

A committee of the Bureau of the Budget has proposed that the federal government set up a National Data Center to compile statistical information on various facets of our society. Certainly the computer can help us simplify record-keeping by assigning everyone a "birth" number that will identify him for tax returns, banking, education, social security, the draft, and other purposes....But such a Data Center poses a grave threat to individual freedom and privacy. With its insatiable appetite for information, its inability to forget anything that has been put into it, a central computer might become the heart of a government surveillance system that would lay bare our finances, our associations, or our mental and physical health to government inquisitors or even to casual observers. Computer technology is moving so rapidly that a sharp line between statistical and intelligence systems is bound to be obliterated....As information accumulates, the contents of an individual's computerized dossier will appear more and more impressive and will impart a heightened sense of reliability to the user, which, coupled with the myth of computer infallibility, will make it less likely that the user will try to verify the recorded data. This will be true despite the "softness" or "imprecision" of much of the data. Our success or failure in life ultimately may turn on what other people decide to put into our files and on the programmer's ability, or inability, to evaluate, process, and interrelate information....Eventually, these bureaus will make a network of their computers, creating a ready source of detailed information about an individual's finances. The accuracy of these records will become increasingly crucial; an honest dispute between a consumer and a retailer over a bill may produce an unexplained and unexpungeable "no pay" evaluation in the computer and result in considerable damage to the buyer's credit rating. link worth reading

Re:And a criminal organization with patience ...

[Opportunist]

And now imagine you have this information because you're allowed to have it, because you're some sort of federal agency. Ain't ever been easier to get rid of whoever you want. Forget hitmen, they leave a mess (and some nosey reporters might even poke into it since you can't easily turn off free press). Identity poisoning is the way of the political assassin of the future.

Re:and yet...

[Marful]

"They that can give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin

"The only way Governments can induce citizens to surrender their rights is convincing them that by doing so, they will gain a measure of safety in exchange." - Thomas Jefferson

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of Human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves." - William Pitt

Corrections

[geekoid]

"He had nothing to hide because he was innocent, so everything worked out in the end, right~"

Fixed it for you.

Re:Strange... you missed the whole thing.

[gknoy]

The odds are much better that you'll get shot with your own gun in the scenario you describe. Also, consider that police officers miss nearly 90% of the time when they discharge their weapons. They have lots of training up front and ongoing training in firearms use which you almost certainly do not have. What makes you think your skills are better than theirs?

I picture the scenario as such:

Person enters my house without permission.
Person is either unarmed, or armed.
Person's intentions are either to steal from me or to hurt/rape my family.

Now, finding that an invader is in my home, I do not know how armed or hostile the adversary is. In such a case, it seems imprudent to be overly optimistic. If my goal is to maximize the safety of my family, I need to assume the worst: the adversary is both armed, and intends to harm my family. My threat-response choices should be based on this expectation.

So, versus an armed hostile adversary, my options are, in increasing levels of severity:

1) Run away. Get everyone out of the house, in the car, and Far Away.
2) Threaten adversary. Accept possibility that I will be harmed in the process.
3) Harm adversary. Accept possibility that I will be harmed in the process.
4) Kill adversary. Accept possibility that I will be harmed in the process.

Let us examine the viability of each of these.

1) Run Away.

If this is possible, I want to do it. I'd much rather avoid confrontation, and make sure that no one gets hurt. However, in the case of a home invasion, the invader is quite likely to be between my family and the exit. If the adversary is hostile, we could be at risk. (Yes, we could open a window and escape that way; this isn't always guaranteed.)

Additionally, if I were to find the adversary already harming my family (or me), it's too late to do this (to an extent).

2) Threaten Adversary.

-- Call the police, and notify the adversary that they are on the way. Unarmed assailants are likely to be scared off, but I am not optimistic that an armed assailant would be convinced to go. They might take hostages. I realize this is not reasonable, but crazy people, psychos, or people who are high on $Drug are unlikely to be thinking completely rationally.

-- Any other threat I might make (to harm or kill the adversary myself) requires that the adversary believe I can and will do such a thing. Thus, this requires that I arm myself in a manner which will be percieved as a threat by all attackers.

A knife, sword, or spear won't do. A firearm is the weapon of choice, and I'd prefer a shotgun. Anything less is an automatic failure versus an assailant with a gun. (Yes, I know about the lethal distance. Yes, a short spear would be fantastic for CQ fighting in my house ... and scary as hell, I imagine. However, it's still an inferior threat.) A blade may scare away that burglar with a knife, or the rapist with a box cutter, but will do nothing when they have a pistol, and may even aggravate their intentions.

Threats also have a chance to escalate into a combat situation ("You're welcome to try, have at thee!"). In such a case, I'd much prefer that I have an unfair advantage.

3) Harm Adversary.

This is both legally and ethically problematic, to me. If someone is an active threat to the life of my family or me, I do not feel it is prudent to try to "injure" them (not to mention that it's likely to impede my performance, as "shooting to wound" doesn't work). If someone is NOT an active threat to my life or my family, then I would be liable (legally) for having assaulted the invader. Anyone that I'd feel it's ethical to harm in self defense is an enemy which would be better completely unable to harm me, and therefore dead.

If I could disarm them safely, and then further ensure that they couldn't hurt me or my family, that see

Re:Strange... you missed the whole thing.

[RattFink]

A gun in your home is 22 times more likely [nih.gov] to kill a member of your family than an intruder. Did you read the same abstract I did? This one was neither limited to family members nor death. Furthermore they do not differentiate if the it is the owner of the home or their family who injured or killed someone with a gun. To back this point up they note they include two incidents of police officers using their gun in the line of duty, making them not the owner of the house. Of course that is sort of moot since that wasn't what he asked in the first place.