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Contrary to the common belief that identity theft is the plague of the twenty first century attributed to development of modern technologies, this phenomenon has existed for centuries. (Newman, 2005) Various types of identity theft existed long before the ‘age of information technology’. (Perl, 2003) Impersonation is an ancient crime (Schneier, 2007) but since for a long time, it was only the means for committing other, frequently more serious crimes, perpetrators were prosecuted for the ultimate offenses, the problem of identity theft was neglected.

When people started living in organized groups and invented postal services, they started identifying each other by names and numbers. (Newman, 2005) In early days, a plethora of, what is today considered to be private information, was publicly available, and anyone could easily find anyone else’s address, birth date, credit worthiness, or later car plate numbers. More importantly, people tended to spend all their lives within miles from their place of birth and almost everyone knew everyone. Decisions on granting loans and offering jobs was made based on personal recommendations and reputation of the individual established within the local community. Very little harm could be done by using identifiers of another person, who lived far away from the crime scene – with exception of avoidance of prosecution which was again easily detectable. As Schneier suggested, the rise of information-based credentials gave identity theft a modern spin. (Schneier, 2007) It was the late twentieth century that witnessed those new developments. As LoPucki noticed, decline in availability of personal information in the 1970 coincides with the rise of identity theft as we know it today – identity theft with an aim of not only evading the justice but gaining a direct financial benefit. The same author claims that what is known as identity theft today, emerged in the 1980s, becoming epidemic in 1990s (LoPucki, 2003)

It is not known when and who coined the term identity theft for the first time. It is found in only nine articles in the LEXIS database Allnws file from 1980 to 1986. (LoPucki, 2003) It was in 1995 that Postal Inspection Service began tracking mail theft cases that involved fraudulent credit card applications and change of addresses, while Secret Service began tracking cases that involved identity takeover in 1997. (Gordon, 2004) It was the state of Arizona that first recognized the crime in 1996. (Newman, 2005) Very soon the US Government took the problem seriously and introduced the Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act in 1998 followed by establishing of Identity Theft Data Clearinghouse by the Federal Trade Commission in 1999. (Gordon, 2004) Unfortunately, it wasn’t until 2001 and the events of September 11 that society realized the extent to which this crime is involved in commitment of other crimes and even terrorism. (Willox, 2002)

This post presents a very brief history of identity theft in the Untied States, but more importantly shows that the crime is not a plague of the twenty first century as many believe. Recently recognized, it is an ancient, a self sustainable crime only facilitated by, not a byproduct of modern technologies. In spite of the popular belief that Internet is the main driving force behind the identity theft and condicio sine qua non, Perl (Perl, 2003) argues that Internet only impacted the growth (or visibility). Other academic researches of the correlation between modern technologies (including the Internet) and trends in identity theft agree with this statement. The latest report commissioned by the Federal Trade Commission suggests that technologies do not increase the risk of identity fraud, but rather provide the best means for fraud detection. (Johannes, 2006)

As we will see later , it was only recently that identity theft was recognized as a crime. This recognition prompted a more serious research and education, which in turn increased public attention and made a wrong impression about trends in this crime.

References:

Gordon, Gary R, et al, Identity Fraud: A Critical National and Global Threat, Journal of Economic Crime Institute, Volume 2, Issue 1, Winter 2004

Johannes, Rubina, et al, 2006 Identity Fraud Survey Report, Javelin Strategy and Research, January 2006

LoPucki, Lynn M., Did Privacy Cause Identity Theft?, Hastings Law Journal, Vol. 54, No. 4, April 2003

Newman, Graeme R. and Megan M. McNally, Identity Theft Literature Review, National Institute of Justice Focus Group Meeting, July 2005

Perl, Michael W., It’s not always about the money: Why the state identity theft laws fail to adequately address criminal record identity theft, Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 94(1): 169-2008, 2003

Perl, Michael W., It’s not always about the money: Why the state identity theft laws fail to adequately address criminal record identity theft, Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 94(1): 169-2008, 2003

Schneier, Bruce, Security Matters – Solving Identity Theft, Forbes.com, January 22, 2007, 6:00 AM ET

Willox, Norman A. et al, Identity Fraud: Providing a Solution, Journal of Economic Crime Management, Volume 1, Issue 1, Summer 2002