The artist Heath Bunting worked a lot about fake identity
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heath_Bunting
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/27/arts/design/27iden.html?_r...
Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
51–60 of 117 posts
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#52Source: a long time ago I read several books on this topic because I collected odd books and I found three of them in an estate sale. The instructions below are how this was done in the early 90's and earlier, but today, with increased security and faster records access, the information is probably well out of date. Traditionally, the best way to do this has always been to establish a solid "breeder document". This i…
>for the right price (a couple of hundred thousand, last I heard), will get you a diplomatic passport from a dodgy country
I don't buy this. Sure you'll be able to buy a passport, but a diplomatic one - I doubt it. And if by some miracle you do pull it off then the country issuing the passport will be so dodgy that nobody recognizes it anyway.
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#53On the flip side of these fine folks, you can obtain a real new identity with relative ease, and totally legally. Of course, this will not prevent someone truly dedicated to locating you, but it will make it much more difficult.
0) Pay off all of your debt
1) Go to a small town
2) Legally change your name
3) Regenerate all of your essential documents, with your new name
4) Move to a big city
5) Change your lifestyle entirely (use the internet only where necessary, use cash wherever possible, don't log back into facebook/hacker news, etc)
6) Don't give someone a reason to come looking for you (i.e. pay your taxes regularly, don't become a missing person, etc)Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#54The first thing to do is realize that there are only a few limited situations in which you are ever legally obligated to tell the truth (or to say anything at all). Allow that to empower you and the truth will literally set you free. Truthfully, you are almost always free to lie. Find those boundaries and tiptoe without crossing them. I imagine that even if you are able to take advantage of some of the other advice i…
Note that lying to a federal investigator, even when you don't even realize it or realize that it has any bearing on anything, is a crime (in the US). It's inadvisable to lie to the police, FBI, etc.
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#55Source: a long time ago I read several books on this topic because I collected odd books and I found three of them in an estate sale. The instructions below are how this was done in the early 90's and earlier, but today, with increased security and faster records access, the information is probably well out of date. Traditionally, the best way to do this has always been to establish a solid "breeder document". This i…
>for the right price (a couple of hundred thousand, last I heard), will get you a diplomatic passport from a dodgy country I don't buy this. Sure you'll be able to buy a passport, but a diplomatic one - I doubt it. And if by some miracle you do pull it off then the country issuing the passport will be so dodgy that nobody recognizes it anyway.
A reporter / filmmaker does it here:
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#56Let me be the first to welcome those fine representatives of three letter agencies to this discussion. I hope you enjoy your stay and enjoy watching the process of having turned almost a whole industry against you. Thanks to your "freedom enhancement techniques" even (most likely) innocent citizens are by now considering using methods previously reserved for high level criminals.
When you use fake-quotes like "freedom enhancement techniques" and someone discovers that no three-letter agency or government organization has ever actually said such a thing -- that such a quote isn't exactly grounded in reality (Google only turned up http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/01/31/832543/-President-P... , which was satire), they're inclined to believe "Hey, if they weren't entirely truthful with this asp…
I see you're a man that sticks to his facts. You definitely brought the real point home.
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#57Source: at 17 I was running a black-hat hacker collective and had, through a series of bad choices, got pretty deep into the 'real-world' side of that business: fraud. The day after my 19th birthday my house was raided by the US Secret Service and the UK Serious Organised Crime Agency in a worldwide coordinated swoop that took in dozens of loosely affiliated people. I have since completely rebuilt my life, so I don't…
Since you clearly know the process, can you give some tips on protecting yourself?
Actually my biggest lesson about identity theft is that most people just don't need to worry. The negative effect of identity theft in 9999/1000 cases is just the inconvenience of correcting the mistakes by informing various institutions about it. In the last 5 years or so, banks have got very good at clearing up the mess fast.
You need to assess the risk, taking into account the very low probability of having your identity stolen and the fairly low inconvenience, against the time and effort it takes to take protective measures. Don't live in fear of it.
That said, the single best way to protect yourself from random ID theft is to use a decent bank with good fraud protection. In the UK, Barclays and HSBC are very good, Natwest and Halifax are very bad. Citibank is a bad US one.
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#58Source: at 17 I was running a black-hat hacker collective and had, through a series of bad choices, got pretty deep into the 'real-world' side of that business: fraud. The day after my 19th birthday my house was raided by the US Secret Service and the UK Serious Organised Crime Agency in a worldwide coordinated swoop that took in dozens of loosely affiliated people. I have since completely rebuilt my life, so I don't…
> Everyone gets caught in the end. How would you know if they didn't?
I have a large sample size of the people I worked with over 8 years. Seriously, everyone went down eventually.
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#59Source: a long time ago I read several books on this topic because I collected odd books and I found three of them in an estate sale. The instructions below are how this was done in the early 90's and earlier, but today, with increased security and faster records access, the information is probably well out of date. Traditionally, the best way to do this has always been to establish a solid "breeder document". This i…
> Given today's software, it's trivial to fake a "photocopy" of an ID.
How would one even go about doing this? Sounds rather difficult to make a fake ID convincing.
Can anyone share some links on the subject?
Re: Ask HN: How does one create a fake identity?
#60Source: a long time ago I read several books on this topic because I collected odd books and I found three of them in an estate sale. The instructions below are how this was done in the early 90's and earlier, but today, with increased security and faster records access, the information is probably well out of date. Traditionally, the best way to do this has always been to establish a solid "breeder document". This i…
> Given today's software, it's trivial to fake a "photocopy" of an ID. How would one even go about doing this? Sounds rather difficult to make a fake ID convincing. Can anyone share some links on the subject?
It's difficult to make a convincing fake ID, but trivial to make a fake "photocopy" of an ID.
Photocopies are low quality, often black and white. They bypass most, if not all, security features on physical ID documents, can be digitally altered, etc.