$50 BILLION RIPOFFShurtleff Speaks on Identity Theft

By Roy Burton Standard-Examiner Staff Rburton@, Standard-Examiner, Ogden, Utah

Nov. 1--OGDEN -- Shortly after birth, every American undergoes a government-mandated procedure that leaves them vulnerable to financial parasites and long-term damage: receiving a social security number.

That nine-digit number provides access to your dealings with financial institutions, your mortgage holder or your employment and education histories.

Or it can provide access for identity thieves to open accounts and run up charges in your name.

Identity theft is estimated to be a $50 billion industry, Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said Friday night at Weber State University.

Shurtleff spoke briefly to a small group in the Shepherd Union Building as part of a statewide campus tour talking about identity theft and how to prevent it, as well as promoting the Web site his office has developed to combat the problem, www.idtheft.utah.gov.

A truck from Enable Secure Shred, of Ogden, was available outside the building to provide free document shredding.

"When your identity is stolen, not only do they steal from you your finances, but they destroy your credit and they destroy your good name," Shurtleff said.

"Even though the ID thieves are going high tech, we still have a lot of low-tech thieves," he said.

"They still go through your garbage."

ID bandits also may be watching over your shoulder when you enter your PIN number at the ATM or listening when you give your Social Security number to a clerk, he said.

The attorney general's Web site, called IRIS (for Online Identity Theft Reporting Information System), is the only site of its kind in the nation. It can be accessed at www.idtheft.utah.gov.

Utah was also the first state, in 2007, to pass legislation forcing national credit reporting agencies Equifax, TransUnion and Experian to offer credit report freezes with a 15-minute "unthawing" period.

A credit freeze costs $10 per reporting agency, but is free for identity-theft victims.

That prevents anyone who has your information from using your credit to buy a house, a car or other item without a PIN number. With the PIN, you can unfreeze your credit within 15 minutes if you decide to make a transaction.

Scott Morrill, project manager for the IRIS site, said identity theft is the fastestgrowing problem for law enforcement. IRIS allows identity fraud victims to report the crime online, then the site identifies the proper law enforcement agencies and provides them the relevant details for investigation.

"Since 2006, we've had more than 2,400 people sign up and over 3,300 reports entered on the Web site," Morrill said.

Morrill said he's heard of people working more than 600 hours to clear their name after identity theft.

He recommends regularly monitoring your credit reports through www.annualcreditreport.com, which was mandated by the FACT Act to allow consumers to view credit reports free from each agency once per year.

He also suggests signing up for the Do Not Call list, getting off junk mail lists and shredding documents as well as using the credit freeze option to prevent fraud.

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