331–340 of 347 posts
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Why do you think that calling something theft blames the victim of the theft?
It isn't blaming the victim. I think they meant something else but worded it that way. What they meant was 'redefining the victim'. The victim is the bank, who got defrauded. They then call it 'identity theft' instead of 'bank fraud'.
Well, we have no idea about that :)
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It was creating for the purpose of tracking an individual's account by the Social Security Administration. It later became a de facto identifier and, even worse, is many times abused as a form of authentication, but it was never designed to be either. As a result, we have processes that ask for or require a social security number that aren't even related to the purpose for which it was created: Health care, loans, de…
> some citizens of certain religious sects, like the Amish, do not have social security numbers. Fun story: many years ago, I worked on some consumer tax prep software. Specifically because of the Amish, the SSN field was optional. Imagine that - an Amish person using tax prep software.
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Was there a period where you could register those separately? My old google account receives emails for both domains.
There must have been, else I wouldn't be in this situation.
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“Everything works just fine” It definitely worked great for a lot of dictators, tax cheats and the sort… I think Switzerland is a great example of why complete privacy isn’t fair on ordinary taxpayers - it allows the ultra-rich to hide what they owe
You're behind the news. The USA pierced that privacy years ago.
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“Everything works just fine” It definitely worked great for a lot of dictators, tax cheats and the sort… I think Switzerland is a great example of why complete privacy isn’t fair on ordinary taxpayers - it allows the ultra-rich to hide what they owe
I'm an American living in Switzerland for over 10 years, and this was definitely my impression as well. But that isn't really the case anymore here - you can no longer have anonymous (i.e. only numbered) accounts, and Switzerland is no longer a preferred locations for dirty money. The ironic thing is that one of those new hot spots, in addition to the usual suspects like Cyprus, the Caribbean, etc., is the USA. See h…
Of course, privacy enabled the bankers to do shady things, but this wasn't the initial motivation. Swiss people value their privacy overall.
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It isn't blaming the victim. I think they meant something else but worded it that way. What they meant was 'redefining the victim'. The victim is the bank, who got defrauded. They then call it 'identity theft' instead of 'bank fraud'.
> I think they meant something else but worded it that way Well, we have no idea about that :)
In any case if it meant literally 'blaming the victim' it makes no sense at all, so either we give the benefit of assuming the poster is able to make coherent statements or we don't.
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I think the point that's trying to be made is, the traditionally recognized 'victim' is not the actual victim. The person whose "identity" was "stolen" is not a victim, the bank is. What was stolen was money--from the bank. But, we've designed our system, laws, contracts, etc such that the third party who was not involved at all has all responsibility of cleaning up the mess shoved onto them
I don't really understand this. If you pay me to store your car in my garage, and it's stolen, who is a victim of car theft?
But another, more common scenario here is that I convince the bank that I'm you and get a credit card or loan from the bank. Now the bank is knocking on YOUR door asking you to pay them back for the cash they handed to some random person... but they're the ones who messed up by giving cash to a random person and not verifying that they are who they say they are!
You aren't really involved... the bank messed up by going "Oh you say you're Bob? Okay here you go!" Why is it your fault that they failed to accurately verify the identity of the person they gave THEIR money to? You didn't play any role in them deciding who to give their money, nor in their ID verification procedures.
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> We need DMVs to begin issuing IDs that are physical with digital capabilities, like credit cards. We need the equivalent of Apple/Android Pay for identity online. We need to mandate that banks support digital IDs. And we need strict enforcement for people who misuse a digital ID. And how will all this magically work online? Answer: you'll have to provide whatever digital secret gives you access, just the way you pr…
Actually, you can use cryptography to prove who you are without giving anyone else the ability to simply "copy" your ID and impersonate you later. It's how message signing works: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_signature#Authenticati... Some countries already have national ID systems that use cryptography like this to secure identify oneself online, such as Estonia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estonian_identi…
Also, the Estonia system apparently includes keys allowing the manufacturer to perform card operations. How do I know that won't get hijacked?
Stepping back, and looking at the situation as a whole: the real problem is a lack of privacy laws. Banks, businesses and employers should be prohibited from sharing your personal information with third parties. I live in Switzerland, where this is the case. Even the government doesn't get this information. If the government thinks you're cheating on your taxes, they have to use warrants and follow the same procedure…