Rosie
Baez
English 113B
English 113B
Professor
Lawson
Final
Draft-Matters with Identity Theft
Feb
28th 2013
Word
Count:1,219
Matters with Identity Theft
In over a decade our resources in
technology have advanced tremendously. Every year there is some amazing new and
better device coming out for everyone to purchase. Everyone gets super thrilled
when they see new technology, such as a cellphone chip which will allow you to
easily stand in front of a cashier and wave your phone to purchase an item.
Also, social networking sites allow you to feel very comfortable putting your
personal information on the Internet. However, these advances in technology are
actually the causes of numerous cases of identity theft.
The way I see identity theft is
anyone being able to steal all identification about you and using it to their
advantage. The identity thief looks for an individual or a family that is wealthy. In the process of taking people’s identity the
thief investigates the victim by searching for information about where they
live, how they live, what they do for a living, or basic necessities about
their life that they can use. With the information the impersonators have about
their victims, they go about their business being whoever they have chosen to
steal from. The main items they take are money from savings, checking, and saving
bonds that the individual or family might have saved. Another way identity
theft could occur is someone taking a social security number to file a tax return
to get a refund or using an identity to get a job, which is the case in the
video IRS ID Theft Are You a Victim
of Identity Theft?. Almost everyone has encountered one form of
identity theft. According to Bert-Jaap Koops and
Ronald Leenes, there are thousands of victims around the world who have been
involved in identity theft cases. When one hears the words “identity
theft” it is easy to imagine victim in a panic, chasing their thieves running
away with their identities (“Identity
Theft”). To explain further, identity theft does eventually run through
people’s minds once they have seen it happen to someone or have heard it on the
news. The thief’s main goal is to get the monetary benefits of the victim not
just to steal their identity. “Identity criminals do not steal identities: they
use identity as a tool to steal money” (“Identity
Theft). What often happens is the victim never notices the situation until
after he or she realizes the damages the theft caused. People are naïve to identity
theft, thinking that it will never happen to them.
When new
cell technology comes out every year most people get so excited about it, that
they do not realize it can be one of the major causes of identity theft. An article
from the Los Angeles Times called “Cell
phones to keep track of your purchases and you” discusses the whole idea of
new technology making people’s lives much easier. People love the idea of going
shopping without the drag of waiting in long lines to purchase what they want
or need to get. You just “Wave your phone in front of a
reader at the cash register. The purchase price is instantly deducted from your
checking account like a debit card or applied to a credit card account”. Instead of the swipe of the credit card, it is as simple
as just one wave of a cell phone and the customers are done. There is a downfall
to this method because “In theory, anyone -- or any company or
government agency -- with a desire to do so would be able to identify you from
as much as 300 feet away and track you as you go about your business”. There
goes all your personal information that’s meant to be private.
To give
a prime example of how identity theft could easily happen to anyone, I found a funny
cartoon picture on identity theft involving an innocent victim on the Internet.
The guy in the picture, Mr. Jones, gets a disturbing phone call from an unknown
caller who claims he is from his credit card company. The guy who has made the
call immediately starts asking all kinds of questions about him and his family.
The operator says, “To confirm that I’m speaking with the real Mr. Jones, I’ll
need you to tell me your social security number, date of birth, and mother’s
maiden name.” Once Mr. Jones answers all of his questions there is a sudden
hang-up. Mr. Jones says, “Hello?”, but the identity theft has already begun because
he received all of the information he needed to assume Mr. Jones’ identity. This reveals how people are easily deceived and
feel comfortable with giving out their personal information to strangers.
When social
networking started people assumed it was just another form of talking. The first
social network was Myspace, which allowed users to invite friends they knew or
wanted to know to be their friends. They were able to take pictures, chat with
friends, even post quotes they were thinking about. Then it evolved to Facebook,
Twitter, dating sites, and blogs of some sort. All these networks were made to
share who you were or wanted to be, or more. The personal information may
include the following: birthday, where you live, photos of yourself, age, where
you may work, also where you have traveled. We have never stopped to think what
we are posting on these social networks and we should. People can effortlessly
track where people are or have traveled because of how loosely people share
their lives on these social networking sites. I have had personal experience
because I was one of those users who would share certain things about me on the
social sites. This one girl that I went to high school with would make several false
profiles using me to be her to talk to other people. (Mainly guys). I caught
her doing it three times. She would use my pictures, my name, my age, and
constantly talk to whoever she felt like talking to. Finally I reported her to
the police so she would stop doing what she did. The police told me I was not
the only one she had done this to. Ever since then I have been more cautious
what I put up on these websites. The article Detecting
Spammers on Social Networks talks about the way social networking affects adolescents
into today’s society. Teenagers spend too much of their free time on these
popular sites sharing all their personal details about them. With the
information they share, “for example, cybercriminals
might exploit the implicit trust relationships between users in order to lure
victims to malicious websites. As another example, cybercriminals might find
personal information valuable for identity theft or to drive targeted spam
campaigns”. We need to be watchful for
what we share online because we never know who is watching us on the other side
of the screen.
Identity theft is a serious problem that
should not be taken lightly. There are too many identities being stolen that
sometimes lead to tragedies. We have to learn how to keep personal information
private to protect our identities from strangers. All our personal information
makes us who we are so we should value that and not give it out so easily. Hopefully
we learn from our mistakes and have a better private future.
Works Cited
Bert-Jaap
koops, Ronald Leenes Identity theft, identity fraud and/or identity-related
crime Sep. 2006. Feb 10th
2013.
Callcentercomics.
Comic Strip. callcentercomics.com. Web. Feb 7th2013
Stringhini,
Gianluca, Christopher Kruegel, and Giovanni Vigna. "Detecting Spammers on
Social Networks." Proceedings of the 26th Annual Computer Security
Applications Conference, (2010): 1-9. Feb 26th 2013
IRS - ID Theft Are You a Victim of Identity Theft? Youtube. Published March 16, 2012. Web. Feb 9th.
Larzaus,
Daid Cellphones to keep track
of your purchases -- and you “Los Angeles Times” march 16, 2008. Web Feb 11th
2013.
