Child Identity Theft
In the United States, children are assigned Social Security numbers shortly after birth. That number is then used throughout their childhood on their parents' tax forms, health insurance forms, school records, and for visits to the doctor or dentist's office.
Many people obtain and have access to a child's Social Security number long before the child is ever ready to apply for a job or for credit. Many child Identity Theft cases involve thieves who have gained access to the child's information through a variety of methods, often through accomplices working in schools, insurance companies, or doctor and dentist offices.
Did You Know? Because the credit bureaus and creditors do not have a reliable and efficient means of verifying age, the age of the owner of the Social Security number is generally established in credit records as the age that is provided on the first application for credit. This means that creditors can be deceived into issuing credit in the name of a child or minor who is still below the legal age to apply for credit. The fraud may easily go undetected for many years, as most parents do not perceive a need to regularly review their underage child's credit report.
The misuse of the child's information is often perpetrated by a parent, sibling, or other family member in the child's household, or by an estranged parent after a divorce or separation. In many cases, a parent or family member's excessive spending habits or poor money management may have destroyed their own credit rating. Unable to obtain additional credit of their own, he or she begins to use the child's information and Social Security number to apply for credit. The cycle of mismanagement continues, and the child is saddled with poor credit long before he or she is actually of age to even apply for credit on their own.
Government agencies such as the Internal Revenue Service and the Social Security Administration are aware of millions of duplicate files and resultant erroneous wage reporting that stems from Identity Theft and fraud, though little is done to address it and these agencies typically only release or investigate duplicate file information after a criminal case has been initiated. For example, though the Social Security Administration was in possession of the information, it was only after the Administration finally released file information for a single ongoing criminal investigation in the state of Utah that state investigators were able to discover that the Social Security numbers of two thousand children were being used by others.
An Example of a Real Life Incident of Child Identity Theft
In January of 2007, Brigitte Yuille, a reporter for Bankrate.com, released a story detailing the trials and tribulations of a victim of Child Identity Theft. According to Yuille, the first indication of the theft was discovered in 1994 when the victim's mother received a letter from the IRS indicating that her son's taxes had already been filed. At that time, the victim was 12 years old and working part-time as a model. The victim's mother was filing her son's taxes for him. The following year, the mother received an identical notification from the IRS and so began an ongoing ordeal for the young victim, who was by then 24 years old and still struggling to overcome the problems created by the identity thief.
In an interview with Yuille, the victim (now an adult) stated: "It's more than a nightmare. I have been attempting to purchase a car since I was nineteen, and a home for the past three years. However, I am always denied for the loans I apply for."
The thief reportedly accrued thousands of dollars in collections and credit accounts in the victim's name, generated excessive credit inquiries, and his credit file includes numerous addresses used by the thief. Yuille reported that the victim "still spends almost an hour a day going over paperwork, researching laws, and making phone calls, all in an attempt to clear his name."
The victim's mother was able to track the thief to his then current employer, and attempted to have him arrested by law enforcement. To her dismay, the Chicago Police Department reportedly advised her "… that the misuse of the Social Security number was not their job. It was the job of the Internal Revenue Service. They wouldn't let me file a police report because they said it wasn't in their jurisdiction." The thief continued to use and work under the victim's Social Security number.
At one point during the ordeal, the IRS reportedly sent the victim a letter stating that he owed $4,000 in back taxes and threatening to seize his assets. The victim also received bills for medical services in his name at an area hospital, his electricity has been turned off for fraudulent past-due accounts in his name, and he has received collection notices for fraudulent telephone services. The victim is now attempting to obtain a new Social Security number in order to distance himself from the activities of the thief.
Child Identity Theft is far more pervasive and more harmful than most people realize, yet it is often ignored by legislators - primarily because the problem is not understood (and perhaps because children cannot vote). Currently, there are no federal laws that specifically protect children other than the standard Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act. However, a few states have passed laws specifically intended to provide additional protections to children and/or to children's information, even if not specifically related to the crime of Identity Theft. These states include: California, Florida, Virginia, Nevada, Illinois, and Wyoming.
©Copyright 2008 by Michael Barnett. All rights reserved. Unauthorized use, copying, or distribution without permission is prohibited.
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