The Low-Tech Reality of Identity Theft

By: Lewis Beale
Miller-McCune

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates a little more than one-third of households will refuse to mail out their census forms next year because of fear that sharing personal data could make them susceptible to identity theft.

This is no idle concern — almost 10 million people were victims of identity theft in 2008, a 22 percent rise from the year before. And despite the popular image of some Serbian teenager with superior computing skills hacking into a major mainframe and stealing thousands of pieces of sensitive personal data, then using them to buy flat panel TVs and Blackberries, the majority of identity theft — a whopping 43 percent — comes from such low-tech means as stolen wallets and documents. Only about 1-in-10 thefts are computer-originated.

Those final two figures, in fact, tend to confirm the findings of "Understanding Identity Theft: Offenders' Accounts of Their Lives and Crimes," a study published earlier this year in Criminal Justice Review. Conducted by Lynne M. Vieraitis of the University of Texas at Dallas, and Heith Copes of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, the study is based on interviews with 59 identity thieves incarcerated in federal prisons. The goal of the study was to determine the demographic characteristics of these criminals and how they commit their crimes.

"One of the things we found most surprising is it seems to be very democratic in terms of who's committing [identity crimes]," says Vieraitis. "There are people who are more like street offenders and those closer to the white-collar-type fraudster."

(More here.)