Abstract
Reports of identity theft in the U.S. have risen since the 2000s, which has resulted in financial losses into the billions. Along with this rise is the increased likelihood of familial identity theft. In this study, the differences between familial and non-familial identity theft were explored through the January–July 2012 Identity Theft Supplement collected with the National Crime Victimization Survey. Results showed that family member victims were likely to have experienced one type of identity theft more often than non-family victims were, personal information used for other fraudulent purposes, which included government benefits and driver’s licenses. Factors that allowed for a respondent’s personal information used for other fraudulent purposes included family membership, young persons in the household, and repeat victimization. Findings suggest that few factors can predict the likelihood to experience the misuse of personal information and that familial identity theft may be difficult to detect.
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Notes
NCVS-ITS respondents must be at least 16 years of age and English-speaking.
Hereafter, ITS respondents who identified the offender, as a family member will be referred to as family member victims and their counterparts referred to as non-family member victims.
Includes using personal information to: file a fraudulent tax return, get medical treatment, apply for a job, provide false information to police, rent an apartment or house, apply for government benefits, some other action, obtain goods or services, obtain a driver’s license and/or vote, hack into your e-mail address, obtain cash, and other/reason unspecified.
Race (e.g., White) and ethnicity (e.g., Hispanic) are separate variables due to how the ITS questions were phrased regarding race and ethnicity (one question each). To demonstrate, the question of race included an “other” option, and resulted in a number of undefined races (e.g., “two other races”, “three other races”). It is uncertain whether the race ITS question was answered by a Hispanic respondent and ultimately categorized as “two other races/three other races”. Therefore, we decided to keep White separate from Hispanic.
Although not shown, independent t-test samples indicated no significant differences were found among the continuous variables between family and non-family member victims of identity theft
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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest. This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
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Navarro, J.C., Higgins, G.E. Familial Identity Theft. Am J Crim Just 42, 218–230 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12103-016-9357-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12103-016-9357-3