The No. 1 source of identity fraud

Opinion

Jan 27, 20051 min

You’re more likely to suffer identity theft from losing your wallet than you are having your personal information hacked online.

That’s the upshot of the 2005 Identity Fraud Survey Report, which also found the leading suspects in any identity theft would be your family, friends or neighbors.

Numbers of note from the survey:

Computer crimes accounted for 11.6% of identity theft in 2004, vs. 68% from paper sources.
The leading source of identity fraud was 28.8% from a lost or stolen wallet, credit card or checkbook.
The average loss for online identity theft was $551, vs. $4,543 from paper.
Only 1.7% of fraud losses came from phishing.

More results can be found here.

Via USA Today

Data Center

by Michael Cooney

Senior Editor

Michael is a senior editor with Network World focused on deciphering the strategies of many core high-tech vendors such as Cisco, Arista, Juniper, HPE and IBM. Michael has been writing about the industry for more than 33 years and has won coverage awards from ASBPE and FOLIO. He has a BA in Journalism and Technical Writing Certificate from The Pennsylvania State University.

He can be reached at michael_cooney@foundryco.com.