Identity Theft and Biometrics as a Method of Preventing It

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Identity theft is what occurs after a person illegally obtains another’s personal information and makes use of it for his own purposes like purchase goods or obtain services under that person’s name. This crime is the fastest-growing white-collar one in the United States today. It is costly to its victims, businesses, or consumers alike. The whole crime is simple. Once they have in their hands the personal information they require, then they could pretend to be the person whose identity they stole. Once they did that, they could now start running up bills or obtaining benefits that are allocated for that person only. (Beaugard, 2003).

This is an enabling crime, or in other words, it’s a crime that aids in the actualization of other crimes. These crimes may range from passing bad checks to ripping off credit card companies to more serious terrorist attacks. Fraudulently obtained and/or mishandled SSNs, birth certificates or driver licenses are the means for identity hoaxes. Getting just any of these three, the other remaining two would be rather easy to obtain already (O’Caroll, 2003).

The Internet just makes everything much faster and much more possible for this crime to proliferate. It only takes several mundane steps to complete the whole process of this crime. First off, these would-be offenders search the Internet. Input “find Social Security numbers” in the search box in search engines and there would be as many as 65 identity sites that would come up. These sites would obtain the number of a person one seeks for a small fee relatively. Fast and quite cheap, the internet enables these thieves to become armed with a name and social security number, and voila, they could now apply for credit cards, take out loans or make unthinkable purchases (Marlin, 2000).

Many of the officials confirmed that Internet growth had indeed increased the opportunities for criminal activities. Concerns had long been raised regarding the risks associated with these computerized database services, an industry that is extensively used by both the private and public sectors to find and verify someone’s identity (US GAO, 1998).

The Internet offers unmatched opportunities for those in search of a new identity. One of the anomalies of Internet use is that online, sincerity and credibility of identity are difficult to confirm. This leads to both the internet users being a little bit careless with regard to their personal information when they are online than they would be in real-life situations. Some websites may even exist solely to take advantage of the desire of various people for information about other people. These information brokers provide information about an individual’s medical records, bank details, credit rating, criminal record, driving license, and vehicle registration documents for a fee. In short, everything that the fraud needs to decide on a victim and misuse his or her identity is readily available on the Internet (Finch, 2003).

The Internet search engines also exemplify unparalleled speed and accuracy that make sure that all the references to a specific individual can be accumulated within a matter of seconds, accelerating the time the criminal needs in order to choose a victim well. If not through the internet, the criminal who would choose someone to steal from would have to go through a meticulous search into the victim’s background, using up a lot of time and effort. With the internet, this information is just a few keystrokes away and this could be done at the comfort of the criminal’s home. The Internet provides identifying information through both illegal and legal means (Finch, 2003).

The criminals using the internet have the luxury of anonymity when engaging in theft through the internet. Furthermore, a sense of unreality may be felt throughout the process, since when they shut down the computer, everything may seem as if had not happened, the crime just left inside that box. Moreover, there is an ease with which users can create multiple identities online, adding to the sense of freedom they feel from the limitations of everyday offline life (Finch, 2003).

Therefore, to reduce this crime, information handed over to the internet should be better regulated and protected. There are three classifications of identification information. The first one is something produced as a means of identification. An example of this is the passport. Secondly, something an individual only knows such as his mother’s maiden name or the assigning of passwords. Lastly and much more personal, identification is based upon the physical characteristics of the individual. This is the use of biometrics such as an individual’s fingerprints, DNA, and retinal images (The Use of Technology to Combat Identity Theft, 2005).

The first two maybe not be that effective and still vulnerable to misuse. There is no guarantee that documents and cards would not be lost and some information not to be forgotten, and resulting in inconveniences for both the individual in question and the institution affected since it has to issue replacements. Not only that, but they are also receptive to being stolen or duplicated. Equally, knowledge can become known to others and be abused, either alone or along with cards and documents (The Use of Technology to Combat Identity Theft, 2005).

Biometric systems avoid many of these complexities abounding these other methods of identification. These systems are exclusively linked to a particular individual and are extremely difficult to reproduce. Biometrics, as briefly mentioned above are based upon some physical attribute that is more or less particular to the individual. As such, it cannot be stolen and misused by fraud. Fingerprinting is mostly used. This method had been employed to determine the identity of offenders since the end of the nineteenth century and has recently, become a tool for some countries in controlling immigration. Computer systems that can keep and recognize fingerprints made the identification process faster and more accurate (The Use of Technology to Combat Identity Theft, 2005).

Aside from fingerprints, there is the method of hand geometry. It is a voluntary scheme that allows participants to circumvent the usual airport procedures and reduces the processing time to a mere 20 seconds. Participants are required to establish their identity in order to be part of such. The palm of their hands is scanned and the image is kept on a smart card. At the airport, the passenger would just have to insert the card into a terminal then scan his or her hands, for the purpose of checking this with the image stored upon the card. The system is highly accurate and can also be instrumental in other situations needing speedy and accuracy in establishing identity (The Use of Technology to Combat Identity Theft, 2005).

Any system that links identifying information permanently with a particular individual has the chance of eliminating identity theft as well. Since biometrics is highly unique to an individual, the likelihood for them to be abused would seem to be nominal. Nonetheless, the dependability of any system of identification based upon biometrics could be spoiled by the weaknesses of a registration system relying on documentary identification. Biometrics has clear advantages over alternative systems of identification. They are incapable of being taken advantage of by impostors as they are linked to a single individual. Few have the same biometric identity. That said, it has a lot to offer as regards reducing the prominence of identity theft. However, there are also disadvantages that cannot be set aside. First of all, these schemes are expensive to develop and implement.

This should not pose a serious impediment to their use due to the potentially immense financial benefits of reducing fraud but that does not make the issue less important. If they are too costly, then the smaller organizations would be restrained from using such. However, the possibility for ‘function creep’, where forms of identification are adopted for different originally unplanned purposes, is a more pressing cause for concern. The existence of a relatively highly dependable scheme might create irresistible temptations on the part of authorities to apply it widely, and inter-relate many separate collections of personal information. It seems likely that the introduction of a presumably unassailable biometric identification system could soon be adopted by a range of institutions until it became the default means of establishing identification (The Use of Technology to Combat Identity Theft, 2005).

All biometric techniques had their distinct strengths and weaknesses in terms of different criteria like accuracy, cost, and user-friendliness among others. By combining two or three of the different techniques, the effectiveness of ensuring against identity fraud is increased.

Biometrics may extract more from its patronizers since they would have to become more intricate and meticulous as with the information being exchanged through the internet. The verification process of one’s personal information becomes for sophisticated and more regulated. It may also induce higher expenses from organizations. But knowing the level of complexity of identity fraud and how the internet makes it so easy to commit, more sophisticated and more highly dependable protection is needed to reduce this. Biometrics may be the best answer to identity fraud yet.

References

Beaugard, Christopher. (2003) Identity Theft: A Violent Nonviolent Crime. Rutgers Cooperative Reseaerch an Extension pp.1-4.

O’ Carroll, Patrick P. (2003) The Homeland Security and Terrorism Threat from Document Fraud, Identity Theft and Social Security Number Misuse. US Senate Committee on Finance pp.1-5.

Marlin, Adam S. (2000) Online Theft a Growing Concern. The Industry Standard. Web.

Identity Fraud: Information on Prevalence, Cost and Internet Impact is Limited. (1998) US General Accounting Office pp. 1-67.

Finch, E. (2003). “What a Tangled Web We Weave: Identity theft and the Internet.” In Jewkes (ed.), Dot.cons: Crime, deviance, and identity on the Internet. (Collompton, England: Willan.) pp. 86-104.

The Use of Technology to Combat Identity Theft (2005) Report on the Study Conducted Pursuant to Section 157 of the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003 pp.1-117.

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Identity Theft and Biometrics as a Method of Preventing It

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