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An Uncreative Plan from the Presidential Identity Theft Task Force

Posted on Jun 10, 2007 by Michelle Pastor

An article criticized the Presidential Identity Theft Task Force for some of the issues we’ve been blogging about for a while.  The article sums up the report of the task force’s findings as this:

The report focuses on four main areas. First, it addresses keeping sensitive consumer data out of the hands of identity thieves through better data security and more education. Second, the report wants to make it more difficult for identity thieves who obtain consumer data to use it to steal identities.

A third area is assisting the victims of identity theft in recovering from the crime. Finally, another goal is deterring identity theft by more aggressive prosecution and punishment of those who commit the crime.

The report in its entirety can be found at www.idtheft.gov.

The article blasts the ID Theft Task Force’s findings as “uncreative” and goes on to point out the weaknesses in the President’s plan of action.

1.  It doesn’t address synthetic ID theft – creating a completely fraudulent identity from a combination of real and fictitious data.  This new identity doesn’t belong to anyone, so with no ‘victim’ the crime is very difficult to detect and can go on forever.

2.  There’s no provision for victims of data breaches to get compensated by the company that let the data slip.  I blogged about this topic earlier.

3.  The report doesn’t address credit-grantor liability which means that there is no responsibility of the credit-grantor to add extra measures to confirm the identity of the applicant.  Read a previous blog about this very issue.

The White House doesn’t always ‘get it’ when it comes to ID theft.  Remember back to when they breached reporters’ identities?  Read more about it here.