Keep My Identity

Greetings, Welcome to Rich's Ramblings

I am in the process of migrating my Blog off another system, so please be patient.

Like so many of us, I've made a New Years resolution to actually Blog. I've been experimenting with Twitter and micro blogging for some time, and decided to go ahead and take the plunge. First I guess a little background is in order, I have been in the computer industry since 1978 (a hobby I'm paid to do - too cool!).

I've been blessed to be a part of some of the most exciting times in the computer industry and can say the best is beaconing on the horizon (but that's another entry, can't spill on the beans at once). ;-)

It's now time for Disclaimer 37 - “The views expressed by this individual (me) do not necessarily reflect the views or ideas of my employer. They are for entertainment purposes only and are considered accurate based on the delusions / medication of the poster and may be used as food for thought or just a good laugh.”

One of my roles at Sun Microsystems, Inc., is in Security so I spend some time thinking about how bad things can happen and how to prevent them. This brought me to thinking about a Plague on our industry – Identity Theft. It's probably coincidental that a commercial for LifeLock came on the radio. You've probably heard it “My name is Todd Davis and My social security number is 457-55-5462” Where they guarantee protect your identity, well it seems to me that credit theft is only one aspect of Identity Theft. Another more insidious that hit me was Income Taxed Theft, wouldn't it be interesting if people started using this SSN for work, thus allowing the IRS to believe someone had made money that wasn't reported as income (this would be against the law, so don't try it). The Government doesn't seem to be discriminating about where they get their money, so long as they get it. I've seen this occur first hand where someone was able to use a SSN that didn't match their name to report income fictitiously. It becomes an interesting exercise to prove your not that person, but even harder is to prove that you did not make that money, nor do you owe taxes on it.

Identity Theft is far broader than Credit Theft, and I have a solution for Credit Theft... Don't use Credit, I personally like Dave Ramsey's idea, pay off your debt, pay cash, and lower that credit score down to Zero so it's useless for criminals to steal. :-)