ID theft soaring as woes worsen

Most of the investigators who deal with identity theft in the Utah Attorney General's Office no longer get mail delivered to their homes. They rent post office boxes.

And one, chief deputy attorney general Kirk Torgensen, spent an afternoon anchoring a locking mailbox in concrete in front of his house.

They know just how vulnerable paperwork makes people in this age of identity theft, a time when too many teens go to buy a first car and find they've already got a long debt history they didn't create and too many adults show up begging for help because their good credit has been stolen — some long after the fact because they don't routinely monitor their accounts.

It's hard to put a number on how many Utahns have had their identities stolen and to what degree, Torgensen says. But Tami Nealy of LifeLock says research indicates that the number of people trolling the Internet for personal information has increased about 38 percent since last September, about the time it became clear the economy was souring. It's unknown what they're searching for or how they intend to use personal data they find, but that's a pretty good reason to be extra vigilant about preventing identity theft, experts agree.

The Federal Trade Commission has seen a 16 percent uptick in the number of Utah cases reported, said Nealy, who adds it's probably an undercount, since many people don't know to file with the FTC.

Often, the identity thief is someone you know well — a friend or brother or even a daughter. Much of it is not random; for instance, Postal Service spokesman Ron Hubrich notes that the FTC says fewer than 2 percent of identity theft cases cite stolen mail as the source of the purloined information. The source is much more likely to be someone you know. You have to be cautious on a lot of fronts.

And tough economic times always seem to increase certain crimes, says Richard Hamp, who prosecutes identity theft for the Utah Attorney General's Office.

"We're going to see a huge increase in ID theft," he predicts. "It's easy to commit and has a high return. People who are walking the edge criminally are going to fall off" in the bad economy.

Investigators are already seeing more of certain scams, like phishing, where you get an e-mail from your financial institution telling you that for security purposes you need to log in (they thoughtfully provide a bogus link) and "verify" yourself with your account number and other identifying information. Reputable institutions don't ask for that stuff online. There are other variations that text your cell phone or call you and ask for the data.