What Europe can teach us about identity theft
An epidemic of identity theft is sweeping the U.S., but it hasn't spread to Europe. Here's what they're doing right.
By Liz Pulliam Weston
Determining the rate of identity theft in Europe is difficult, and the reason is telling: Data security experts say it's not seen as enough of a problem to warrant a comprehensive survey.
The exception is the United Kingdom, where fraud experts estimate 100,000 people, or about 0.17% of the population, fell victim last year to account hijacking, new-account fraud or other types of identity theft.
Compare that to the U.S., where a Federal Trade Commission survey found 10 million ID-theft victims a year -- or 3.39% of the population.
So what is so different in the Eurozone? Several things:
Social Security numbers are for Social Security -- period. Most European residents have national identity cards -- the exception being the U.K., which is still struggling with the concept. Credit......
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