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Your Stolen Identity Goes For $20 On the Internet Black Market
HughPickens.com writes: Keith Collins writes at Quartz that the going rate for a stolen identity is about twenty bucks on the internet black market. Collins analyzed hundreds of listings for a full set of someone's personal information—identification number, address, birthdate, etc., known as "fullz" that were put up for sale over the past year, using data collected by Grams, a search engine for the dark web. The listings ranged in price from less than $1 to about $450, converted from bitcoin. The median price for someone's identity was $21.35. The most expensive fullz came from a vendor called "OsamaBinFraudin," and listed a premium identity with a high credit score for $454.05. Listings on the lower end were typically less glamorous and included only the basics, like the victim's name, address, social security number, perhaps a mother's maiden name. Marketplaces on the dark web, not unlike eBay, have feedback systems for vendors ("cheap and good A+"), refund policies (usually stating that refunds are not allowed), and even well-labeled sections. "There is no shortage of hackers willing to do about anything, computer related, for money," writes Elizabeth Clarke. "and they are continually finding ways to monetize personal and business data."
Sadly, I married and took the last name Coward.
My current identity sucks ass.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
It makes you wonder how many of these "hackers" are just LifeLock employees or other people in trusted positions who just took the data home with them?
(I remember my first job in healthcare. At 19 - pre-HIPAA - I used to browse the medical records of friends, family and famous people on the hospital network when I was bored and alone at work, and it occurred to me once how easy it would be to just save the "best" ones to a floppy each night.)
Are there lists of compromised identities? I'd like to see if I'm on it.
If I was a security researcher and I could but hacks, I think it would be interesting to pay someone to hack "me", all the while recording everything that happens and is done. Would be interesting!
OsamaBinFraudin is a bombastic nickname.
I have $10 in my account....
When do they have their their white sale? On Black Friday?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Same thing, different information gathering method (you give the advertisers that information, natch).
This sounds like an organized, well thought out network. It's a shame that they are only getting $20 a pop. If they were to use their powers for Good instead of Evil, they could probably be making many times more money.
The thing that pisses me off about theft is that the thief only gets away with $5, but the damage they cause is $500. When they steal 40 cents worth of copper from your AC, you now have to buy a new $5,000 AC. When they steal your identity for $20, they ruin your credit for the rest of your life and reduce you to begging on the street. I guess you could steal, too, in order to get by, but most people's ethics wouldn't allow them to do that, even if they are destitute. Human beings don't steal.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
I'm famous.
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Quarter million in student loan debt? Go right ahead and take my identity, we can switch.
Compared to the cost of your organs on the black market.
Political correctness is really just herd psychology pushed by insecure people who desperately seek social conformity.
I could use $20. Hey, it's not stolen if I sell it myself, right?
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Considering how many times my identity has been "compromised" by organizations I've entrusted with my PII (Insurance companies, banks, and several different government agencies), I don't know why I even bother trying to maintain a credit rating at all.
I'm sure I've been bought and sold a dozen times by now. My kids probably have a few defaulted mortgages on their records that they'll get to discover when they apply for student loans in 10 years or so.
Your zeal is misplaced. ID theft wouldn't be an issue if LENDERS WERE NOT LAZY ASSHOLES.
Why should YOU be on the hook for clearing yourself if some LENDER lends "you" money, without actually bothering to really find out it is YOU, and then goes after YOU when it was "you" who actually got the money.
Seems like the lender didn't do due diligence to me! Same thing with credit bureaus, they accept gossip about YOU and repeat it when it was "you", not YOU who actually did the actions.
And somehow YOU are the victim?
Legislation needs to be issued forthwith forbidding ANY lender from putting ANYTHING derogatory in your credit report unless they can PROVE whatever they have a problem with was done by you and no one else. Also, lenders should NOT be able to attempt to collect from a person unless they can prove that self-same person is the person they gave their money to.
ID theft would largely be a thing of the past.
--PM