Criminal Cases

Source:

The Department of The Treasury, U. S. Secret Service Testimony of Mr. James Bauer, Deputy Assistant Director, Office of Investigations for Presentation to the Subcommittee on Technology, Terrorism, and U. S. Government Information of the U. S. Senate Judiciary Committee

I. "Not all identity fraud results in direct monetary loss. The "Washington Post" article described a situation where an individual had his wallet stolen and his identity later compromised. The criminal who stole the wallet was later apprehended for committing additional crimes. When questioned by authorities, the criminal identified himself as the individual that from whom he had stolen the wallet, and he had the identification to prove it. A criminal record was established for the criminal in the original victim's name. As a result, of this criminal record the victim suffered numerous problems, including repeated rejections by potential employers."

II. "Another recent case investigated by our New York and Richmond field offices involved a complex identity fraud scheme wherein identities were stolen and used by a highly organized group of individuals to purchase at least 9 vehicles and more than 15 homes. This case was brought to the attention of the Secret Service after a defendant, using the identity of someone else had attempted to obtain financing for purposes of purchasing a car. The Secret Service contacted the true identity holder and was informed that he had neither applied for financing nor given permission for anyone to do so.

The investigation revealed that this defendant was part of a group of individuals who assumed the identities of

numerous individuals in a successful attempt to apply for and receive home mortgages; home equity loans on the fraudulently purchased homes; and financing for automobiles. Upon approval of financing for the vehicles,

members of the group would purchase the vehicles using the stolen identity. The vehicles would then be

re-registered in another state using counterfeit certificate of title documents to prove ownership. This process would yield a fraudulently obtained genuine registration and certificate of title. The vehicles would then be sold

under new title and the profits either distributed among the group or applied to additional crimes. At this time, this fraud loss is estimated to be in the millions."

III. "This was the case in a Secret Service investigation into an account takeover scheme which resulted in the arrest of a bank employee. It was learned that while working online, using the company's Internet access code, the employee was retrieving client's accounts, changing their mailing address and sending newly issued credit cards with their true identities to himself."

IV. "In an intrusion/extortion case the Secret Service recently investigated, the individuals hacked into an Internet Service Provider (ISP). This ISP provided Internet service to 10,000 customers in South Florida. The hacker was able to compromise the system and shut down 8 of the 10 servers. In addition to the disruption of the service, the hackers also obtained the personal information and credit card numbers of the ISP's 10,000 customers."