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PORTLAND, Ore. — When identity theft suspect Christina Herrera was arrested, she didn't have to wait long to tell her husband. He was in the next holding cell. Herrera and Jason Keno were arrested a half-hour apart, and the coincidence helped police and prosecutors link what had appeared to be separate identity theft investigations. "It was kind of like crook karma that they're both picked up within a half-hour of each other, and we found evidence on each that tied the cases together," Portland Officer Barbara Glass told The Oregonian newspaper. "We're not surprised, never; but we're entertained, always." A...

One illegal alien was arrested this year in Tucson after allegedly using a stolen social security number to buy two homes and rack up over $780,000 in bad debt. Some five million fraudulent home mortgages are in the hands of illegal aliens, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. It's not known how many of those have contributed to the subprime housing mortgage meltdown, but it has affected every state, including Arizona. The problem began years ago when banks were forced to give mortgages without confirming social security numbers or borrower identification. As a result, illegal immigrants...

.....a brazen family of fraudsters took advantage of sloppy subprime mortgage lenders to pull off a mindblowing scheme reeling in more than $200M - a devastating hit that contributed to the nation's financial crisis. Garri Zhigun was part of a Russian fraud ring using false documents, stolen ID's and "straw" buyers for over 1,000 subprime mortgages 2004-06. The 27-member gang worked out of a Brooklyn mortgage brokerage owned by Zhigun's mother........targets included fallen lenders Washington Mutual Bank, conned out of $842,500, Countrywide taken for $396,000.......and preyed on other banks and mortgage companies. Zhigun and accomplice Aleksander "Shorty" Lipkin bought condos...

In what is slowly turning into a endless loop of hacktivism activities, Bill O’Reilly’s BillOreilly.com has been compromised during the weekend, with personal details including passwords in plain text for 205 of the site’s members already leaking across Internet forums, as a response to his remarks regarding Wikileaks as a “one of those despicable, slimy, scummy websites” which recently published private information of Sarah Palin’s private email.

Former State Dept. employee Lawrence C. Yontz, 48, pled guilty before a U.S. magistrate to illegally accessing hundreds of passport files, including those of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain. He didn’t access Sarah Palin’s passport file, presumably because she obtained a passport for the first time last year. According to the Justice Dept.: In pleading guilty, Yontz admitted that between February 2005 and March 2008, he logged onto the PIERS database and viewed the passport applications of approximately 200 celebrities, athletes, actors, politicians and their immediate families, musicians, game show contestants, members of the media corps, prominent business...

"Mike Kernell, a longtime Tennessee state assemblyman from Memphis and a technology enthusiast, is concerned about future elections because the new machines are harder to get a look at. ''We used to be able to check the machines and see if they'd been tampered with,'' he said. ''It is now almost impossible.'' Mr. Kernell wonders whether he will have to hire a computer programmer in his next race to make sure the machines are working smoothly and haven't been tampered with. ''We've hit a brick wall,'' he said." - NY Times A "technology enthusiast" indeed. Did he help with his...

The guy who hacked into would-be VP Sarah Palin’s Yahoo email account is none other than the son of a Democratic state representative from Tennessee, posits GatwayPundit. A convincing amount of evidence suggests the “hacker” (perhaps a status he doens’t deserve) is David Kernell, son of Tennessee representative Mike Kernell.

I'm calling this a vanity because it's not from any source, but I do not consider the topic a true "vanity." WHY HASN'T OBAMA RESPONDED TO THE PALIN EMAIL HACKING? Possibilities (one/more/all): 1. He condones it. 2. He's waiting to see if this turns into a negative for Palin, and if he can ride the lie that she used her personal email for official business while ignoring the fact that a serious crime has occurred. 3. He's behind it or the trail will lead too close to home. Any other thoughts? The silence from the Obama camp is positively deafening....

I'm getting bombarded with e-mails claiming that at least one of the persons responsible for hacking into Sarah Palin's personal e-mail account is David Kernell, the son of Tennessee state representative & Democrat Mike Kernell. The evidence is that the hacker responsible uses the e-mail: rubico10@yahoo.com . That email was used at one time by a person named David Kernell. Democratic politician Mike Kernell has a son named David. Pretty thin, but it's a starting place. Also, earlier I posted that it would be relatively easy to track down the Palin hacker by comparing the Wikileak IPs to the IPs...

You are clever and creative; it's time to find a target worthy of your talents. Like Sarah Palin. Start harassing her! ......PS: Don't blow up our servers. Thanks! .....and that it was time for them to find a new target. We even threw out a suggestion: Sarah Palin! And then yesterday, this happened........ Just last week, we posted a brief open letter to Anonymous, the Internet-based rabble-rousers who have made a name for themselves taking on Scientology, in which we said that they'd succeeded in ruining the Church's reputation, and that it was time for them to find a new...

Sometime early this morning, between approximately 3:00am - 4:00am, members of an infamous group of hackers broke into Gov. Sarah Palin’s private Yahoo e-mail account. The incriminating discussion threads included screenshots of Palin’s e-mail and private e-mail addresses of her contacts. The threads have since been deleted. Hacking e-mail is a federal crime. A TV anchor who broke into his colleague’s e-mail account recently pleaded guilty and faces a maximum five years in prison. The law will catch up to the hackers, but what about the lowlifes who are now gleefully splashing the alleged contents of Palin’s private e-mail account...

This afternoon, I mentioned an infamous group of hackers whose Internet bulletin board was the gathering place for those who bragged about and publicized the Sarah Palin private e-mail hacking. A tech-savvy reader who monitors the hackers’ site e-mailed me a detailed explanation of how it went down, who was responsible, and how someone with a conscience warned a friend of the Palin family of the crime (language warning):

John McCain's campaign said Wednesday it has contacted "appropriate authorities" over a report that Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin's personal e-mail had been hacked. "This is a shocking invasion of the Governor's privacy and a violation of law," campaign manager Rick Davis said in a statement. "The matter has been turned over to the appropriate authorities and we hope that anyone in possession of these emails will destroy them. We will have no further comment." The statement came hours after a user on the Web site WikiLeaks said he had gained access to Palin's Yahoo e-mail account and gained access....

Top Obama fundraiser Jodie Evans stated she used C-SPAN credentials without the cable news outlet's knowledge at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul last week.Also, her Code Pink co-founder Medea Benjamin bragged to the press at the Democratic National Convention that she had convention press credentials under the name of a Christian radio netweork.Evans, who has been a part of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama's campaign finance operations since the beginning of his run for the White House in February 2007, charged the stage when Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin was making her acceptance speech. She claimed to...

Identity crisis Law bars officials from cross-checking Social Security numbers Monday, September 8, 2008 3:12 AM By Jill Riepenhoff and Stephanie Czekalinski THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH Buddy Birdwell has a wife and two kids -- and more lives than a cat. When he's not a resident of northeastern Oregon who refurbishes furniture and belongs to the National Rifle Association, he is: Adrian, a Columbus fast-food worker with a history of domestic violence. Ernesto, a 33-year-old Dublin man caught driving without a license two years ago. Maria Theresa, who bought a $220,000 house in Phoenix in 2006. Carlos in Phoenix; Hector in...

The Internet provides vast amounts of information but it can also spread vast amounts of misinformation, or even deliberately misleading disinformation. For more than two weeks, scarcely a day has gone by without e-mails pouring in to me, asking about columns that someone has written and brazenly spread around the Internet with my name on them. Most of these e-mails have come from regular readers who are savvy enough to recognize columns that have a different style and substance from my own columns. We usually think of "identity theft" as involving using someone else's name for economic fraud. But identity...

PHOENIX (Reuters) - U.S. immigration agents have arrested 595 people at a Mississippi factory in what was the largest workplace enforcement raid in the United States to date, an immigration official said on Tuesday. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Barbara Gonzalez said federal agents arrested the workers in a raid at the Howard Industries Inc. factory in Laurel, Miss, on Monday, "This is the largest targeted workplace enforcement operation we have carried out in the United States to date," Gonzalez told Reuters by telephone. The swoop at the plant, which makes electrical equipment including transformers, was part of an ongoing...

KRQE Channel 13 in Albuquerque aired this disturbing report about criminals, including child rapists, persons convicted of fraud and forgery, and drug dealers, being hired by ACORN to solicit voter registrations: The litany convictions and charges against these individuals is long and this story is not the first problem for ACORN this year nationally or in New Mexico. In June the Dona Ana County Clerk warned citizens about registering with third party groups. Across the country states like Arizona, Arkansas Louisiana, Nevada, Virginia, Wisconsin and others have warned citizens about registering with and providing sensitive personal information to groups like...

(CNN) -- Eleven people were indicted Tuesday for allegedly stealing more than 40 million credit and debit card numbers, federal authorities said. The indictments, which alleged that at least nine major U.S. retailers were hacked, were unsealed Tuesday in Boston, Massachusetts, and San Diego, California, prosecutors said. It is believed to be the largest hacking case that the Justice Department has ever tried to prosecute. Three of the defendants are from the United States; three are from Estonia; three are from Ukraine, two are from China and one is from Belarus. The remaining individual is known only by an alias...

Suit alleges Trademark Infringement, Deceptive Trade Practices, Consumer Protection Act Violation and others. NASHVILLE, Tenn., June 27 NASHVILLE, Tenn., June 27 /PRNewswire/ -- On Wednesday, attorneys for NAMESAFE filed a Federal Complaint in the Middle District of Tennessee against identity theft protection company LifeLock asserting that LifeLock and its CEO Todd Davis attempted to steal the trademark and deceptively divert traffic from search engine users intending to go to NAMESAFE.com. The suit alleges various violations of Trademark Laws and the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act, as well as other causes of action, asserting that LifeLock has attempted to lead unsuspecting consumers...

I'm really thinking about using some sort of identity theft service, especially since I got married and my credit card usage went up. Questions to anyone using these services: Can Lifelock be trusted and does it work? How does it work?

Researchers Say Notification Laws Not Lowering ID Theft Over the past five years, 43 U.S. states have adopted data breach notification laws, but has all of this legislation actually cut down on identity theft? Not according to researchers at Carnegie Mellon University who have published a state-by-state analysis of data supplied by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC). "There doesn't seem to be any evidence that the laws actually reduce identity theft," said Sasha Romanosky, a Ph.D student at Carnegie Mellon who is one of the paper's authors. Romanosky's team took a state-by-state look at FTC identity theft complaints filed...

The importance of full disk encryption solutions for laptops and other digital media has been espoused a myriad of times by numerous security vendors like AlertBoot. WeÂ’ve all heard the stories regarding identity theft, and the importance of keeping Social Security Numbers safe. Then there are those unique stories that cause oneÂ’s jaws to slacken. Those unique, imaginative capers that remind me again and again why protecting data is no laughing matter. For example, SSNs could be used to build up your wealth two cents at a time. Wired.com is reporting that a man in California, Michael Largen, did exactly...

Prevention is not the only element of security,-- digital age, or otherwise when an attacker is successful the next aspect of security is Detection and Response In our world today of course our electronic banking records make a tempting target for attackers. naturally we take reasonable precautions to keep key information from being lost but in addition we monitor balances and transaction records. I check mine pretty much week to week what about the accounts I don't know about? If attackers have stolen my key information, and in this day and age I think I need to proceed on the...

SAN JOSE, California (AP) -- Todd Davis has dared criminals for two years to try stealing his identity: Ads for his fraud-prevention company, LifeLock, even offer his Social Security number next to his smiling mug. Now, LifeLock customers in Maryland, New Jersey and West Virginia are suing Davis, claiming his service didn't work as promised and he knew it wouldn't, because the service had failed even him. Attorney David Paris said he found records of other people applying for or receiving driver's licenses at least 20 times using Davis' Social Security number, though some of the applications may have been...

Identity theft in America goes hand and hand with illegal immigration.As everyone knows, America is experiencing an epidemic of identity theft. In the last five years alone, complaints to the Federal Trade Commission from U.S. residents who have had their identity stolen have skyrocketed 60 percent, to 258,427 in 2007—one-third of all consumer fraud complaints that the commission receives. What’s less well understood, however, is how illegal immigration is helping to fuel this rash of crime. Seeking access to jobs, credit, and driver’s licenses, many undocumented aliens are using the personal data of real Americans on forged documents. The immigrants’...

MOUNT PLEASANT — Friends and family of the 46 people taken to jail by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in April met Sunday with supporters offering legal and emotional support. The federal government moved on Pilgrim's Pride Corp. facilities in Mount Pleasant and in four other states on April 16, gathering some 400 employees on various identity theft charges. A year-long investigation produced the arrests. It also produced a vacuum of information among much of the Latin immigrant community that feeds Pilgrim's Mount Pleasant workforce of about 3,300 people. That lack of information drew an attorney from the Mexican...

(from Laptop Security blog)Even the most carefully laid plans can go awry. Federal prosecutors charged a Southern Californian woman this week with aggravated identity theft after she used a genealogy website to locate people who had recently died and to take over their credit cards. Tracy June Kirkland was using Rootsweb.com to find the names, Social Security numbers and birth dates of people who had died. She would then call credit card companies randomly to see if "she" had an account, if "she" did, she would request a mailing address change and, in some cases, would add her own name...

The first defendants from the April 16 immigration raid at the local Pilgrim's Pride chicken processing plant will be in Federal Court in Chattanooga on Tuesday. They are due to appear at 2 p.m. before Magistrate Susan Kerr Lee for hearings on whether they should continue to be detained. They include: -Jose Luis Ramirez-Vasquez Authorities say he is an alien who was previously deported and came back into the U.S. at Lukenville, Ariz. -Alfred Gabriel-Torres (also known as Jaime Hernandez) He is charged with using an invalid Social Security card for citizenship purposes -Roberto Gabriel-Ramirez Officials said he was deported...

Taxpayer loses $34,000 refund to false filer By Seattle Times staff A Bellevue woman says someone else received her $34,000 tax refund after they fraudulently filed her tax return. The woman, whose name has not been released, contacted Bellevue police Thursday on the advice of the IRS. The woman told police she called the IRS and discovered her return had already been sent to an address in California, said Greg Gannis, spokesman for Bellevue police. The woman said her taxes had been filed at a storefront tax-preparation center in California under her name. "She lost $34,000 and some change," Gannis...

HIMSS Analytics (short for Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society); a “think-tank” for the healthcare management world has just released the 2008 HIMSS Analytics Report: Security of Patient Data. release info. This report examines the security of patient personal identifying information (PII) and protected health information (PHI). In the current data breach crazy world, this is a timely report which tries to get beneath the surface of the needs of health professionals to balance quick access to secure patient health records and the need to protect not only patient privacy but prevent access to information which could lead to identity...

Lifelock Getting Picked Since February 2008, Lifelock, the company that guarantees that your identity will not be stolen has been hammered by legal problems. Lifelock charges consumers $10 a month for the privilege of allowing the company to manage your Fair Credit Reporting Act right to a free initial security alert and which automatically opts out a consumer from pre-approved credit offers for six months. The Lifelock website states: LifeLock, the industry leader in proactive identity theft protection, offers a proven solution that prevents your identity from being stolen before it happens. We'll protect your identity and personal information...

PHOENIX, March 28 /PRNewswire/ -- Today an Arizona consumer filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against LifeLock, a heavily promoted company that claims to protect consumers against identity theft. The lawsuit alleges that the three-year-old company defrauds customers by offering services it cannot legally perform, and by touting a $1 million guarantee that the suit alleges is wildly misleading. Filed in United States District Court for the District of Arizona, the suit seeks to recover money consumers paid to LifeLock. LifeLock, headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, uses aggressive advertising to entice consumers to sign up for its $10-a-month service which it describes...

NEW CASTLE, Colo. — A Colorado man is accused of stealing an Army veteran's identity and using it for 24 years to get married, obtain free medical treatment and even serve as president of a VFW post. Mark Mulcahy, 46, faces felony charges of identity theft, forgery and criminal impersonation. He was being held in the Garfield County jail Friday in lieu of $45,000 bail. It wasn't known whether he had an attorney. Mulcahy obtained a military retirement document in 1984 in the name of David Keith Anderson of Modesto, Calif., according to an arrest warrant affidavit. Anderson, also known...

GILBERT, Ariz. -- An illegal immigrant was arrested after using the identity of a retired peace officer to gain employment, Maricopa County Sheriff's deputies said. Edgardo Alvarado-Navarro, 29, was arrested late Friday at his workplace, Roberts Tire Shop in Gilbert, deputies said. He was taken into custody wearing a uniform shirt with his victim's name patch on it, according to deputies. His arrest came after the officer called the sheriff's illegal immigration hotline to report an identity theft, sheriff's investigators said. During the investigation, Alvarado admitted using his victim's identity to gain employment, deputies said. Alvarado was booked into Maricopa...

Financial Privacy is Common Cents: Government should have warrant to look at private accounts Benjamin Barr, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, March 10, 2008 What’s the value of your financial privacy? You know, things like your checking account and banking records. For most of us, the less others know, the better. That’s why it comes as such a surprise that Arizona rates near the bottom of states when it comes to protecting financial privacy. According to the Federal Trade Commission, Arizona is the number one state for identity theft. And a private research firm reports that one in six Arizona adults...

You might call it a friends, family and ID thieves plan. Last year, identity thieves wormed their way into Michael Carner’s Sprint account, tacked on 14 new cell phones and began ringing up phone charges. Even though he reported the intrusion, things only got worse. For nearly a year, the real estate agent was hit with late fees, frequent automated collections calls, service interruptions, and a $5,000 bill. When Carner finally gave up and tried to cancel his account, Sprint had one more piece of bad news: The imposters had extended his service contract for two years, meaning he'd have...

Brownsville's Latino residents at high risk of identity theft Brownsville, Texas, a city of about 140,000 people, sits on the border with Mexico. It's the southernmost city in the Lone Star State and when it comes to crime, it is typical of most U.S. cities its size, except for one thing: it has an extraordinarily high rate of identity theft. "I would say that our particular substation takes about five or six identity theft reports each week," Lt. Mark Elbert, of the Brownsville Police Department, told ConsumerAffairs.com. "I suspect the department's Main Station and the West Side Station get more...

(CBS4) ― For the eighth straight year, the Federal Trade Commission reports that identity theft is the No. 1 consumer complaint it receives. According to the FTC, nearly 23,000 people become victims of identity theft every day. Now consumers can sign up with several different companies that all promise to help protect their identity. How well do they work? CBS4 found out, when it picked three popular companies and put them to the test. The first company is LifeLock. The CEO of LifeLock actually publishes his social security number to promote his company's ability to protect a person's identity. The...

Hurricane, W.Va. -- Hurricane police called a press conference Thursday to say they were investigating a restaurant in Putnam County. Detectives say they started taking a closer look at the Mi Pueblito restaurant when people came forward noticing purchases on their debit and credit cards, they didn't make. We're told there have been dozens of people that have come forward. Detectives in Hurricane say they're hearing about these types of situations at other restaurants in our region. At the press conference, police urged consumers to use cash instead of their debit or credit cards. Investigators say its easy for someone...

A new report by Identity Theft 911 says illegal immigration, fraudulent employment, methamphetamine use and the state's lack of enforcement have helped keep Arizona as the No. 1 spot for identity theft.

....... Among the 36, six had criminal convictions along with their immigration violations. In a news release, ICE highlighted two of the people arrested: • Merido Mazariegos, 32, of Guatemala, convicted of fifth-degree assault in Minnesota's Nobles County. • Jose Inocente Garcia-Huix, 38, of Guatemala, convicted in Nobles County last year for forging two state identification cards under aliases.

RIP-OFF ALERT: The Berkeley Center for Law and Technology analyzed corporate America to see which companies have the highest incidence of ID theft. The No. 1 company? Bank of America. BoA is the nation's second largest bank. (If you look at the numbers based on total customer base, BoA then actually comes in second behind HSBC). AT&T occupies the second slot, followed by Sprint (No. 3), JPMorgan Chase (No. 4) and Capital One (No. 5). Think about it: 3 of the first 5 are banks, which is understandable. But why are two phone companies way up there? The reason is...

<p>CARPENTERSVILLE, Ill. - Police say identity theft is the reason the Internal Revenue Service recently warned a seven-year-old boy from the northwestern Chicago suburb of Carpentersville that he owed back taxes on $60,000.</p> <p>Officers said Friday the second-grader's identity has been in use by someone else since 2001 -- not long after his birth.</p>

Although the Chino slaughterhouse case triggered national outrage and the nation's biggest meat recall, a second suspect faced only misdemeanor charges when he surrendered this week -- until his aliases and pending drug cases emerged. "His worst problem is the felony possession for sale. It's (punishable by) mandatory state prison," San Bernardino County Deputy District Attorney Debbie Ploghaus said Thursday of the defendant, whose true name she still doesn't know for certain. "We know him as Luis Sanchez, with a birth date of 3-8-75." Under that identity, he is one of two men charged in the Hallmark/Westland Meat Co. case...

McGrath probing service preventing identity theft By ERIN MADISON Tribune Staff Writer The Montana Attorney General's office is investigating LifeLock, a company profiled in Sunday's Tribune. LifeLock is an identity theft prevention service. Customers pay $10 per month to have a fraud alert placed on their credit reports and be opted out of pre-approved credit card offers. If one of LifeLock's members has their identity stolen, the company covers any losses up to $1 million. LifeLock previously ran a full-page ad in the Tribune, which included the Social Security number of the company CEO Todd Davis. That ad piqued the...

A trend embraced by white-collar criminals is driving up health-care costs and creating nightmares for its victims. Medical identity theft is health-care fraud and ID theft rolled into one, and it's a crime that's expected to continue growing because it's easy to carry out and difficult to detect. The first study on the subject, done by the World Privacy Forum (WPF) in 2006, estimates that medical identity theft accounts for 2.7 percent to 3.2 percent of total ID theft, which is reported to be the fastest-growing crime over the last seven years. In November 2007, the Federal Trade Commission estimated...

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The frustration of proving one's age to buy things like alcohol and tobacco does not end when you reach the appropriate legal age. Those of us who are fortunate enough to have a youthful appearance are forever burdened with having to carry a state-issued ID card to every place where we might want to buy alcohol or tobacco. Over the past few years, we've been gradually subjected to another, more intrusive ID-related hassle -- that of electronic drivers license scanning. It's one thing when a government representative scans your driver's license; it's another thing entirely when a restaurant does it,...

Anxiety is rising among local undocumented immigrants who fear they could lose their cars and mobile homes. Some fears may be unfounded. It comes as Indiana's Bureau of Motor Vehicles checks its driver's license and state ID card records with a Social Security database. In November, the bureau sent letters to 206,000 residents whose records didn't match -- a mix of races and situations that included native-born citizens and undocumented immigrants. If the mismatches aren't resolved by Jan. 31, licenses and ID cards will be revoked. And since Nov. 7, the BMV has been checking Social Security records before issuing...