Attn: Veterans! 26.5 Million Veterans' Records Stolen 5-22!!

The reason this happened is quite visible. After working for the U.S. Government via military service, we encrypted EVERYTHING in the units I belonged to - even our S.O.P. documentation! (Standard Operating Procedure) We understood even the slightest bit of information slippage could open the door to much larger problems.

At first, when they said a computer was stolen, I SKEPTICALLY assumed that just maybe the thieves were simply after the hardware - a truly random act. However, when the story was changed to DISCS... the material value of a hard drive or a little plastic disc to a thief is NILL. ZILCH. SQUAT.

A disc is stolen for the value of the INFORMATION on it. And random acts of theft don't include discs unless it looks like it might be a dvd with a good movie on it.

I venture to assume (note that I ASSUME and cannot state this as fact - yet) that this wasn't even a theft. It was FRAMED as a theft so it's easy to pass off the fact that the information was SOLD. The sheer numbers of individuals on the discs, unencrypted is worth MILLIONS of dollars. When someone wants to evade the fact that there is something sneaky going on, they begin to seek a "new identity" even if it does mean it is shared with someone else.

Let us say that each individual's information on those discs is sold for $250 per record. Using basic multiplication: $250 X 26,500,000 = $6,625,000,000

The cash value on the street to supply twenty-six MILLION individuals with new "shared" identities so they can receive social security benefits at retirement without paying into the system is just a tad over SIX POINT FIVE BILLION DOLLARS

The value of those little pieces of plastic were very well understood at the time they were 'stolen'

I don't care what the media says about all of this. What they have to say anymore, in my opinion, is irrelevant.

I might also add... if you have the full name, address, telephone number and LAST FOUR DIGITS OF YOUR SOCIAL SECRITY NUMBER, you can request a copy of the individual's credit report to be sent to any email address you desire if you pay the small fee. Once you have that credit report in hand, you can find out what credit cards a person has. You can also use social engineering practices on the true owner of the information, posing as their credit card company. Then, you simply create a website that looks like your credit card company's actual website, host it overseas, call the individual up and have him/her visit the website to make changes to his/her security infomation because there has been a security breech.

When on the phone with the victim, the thief has information about you that you realize ONLY YOUR CREDIT CARD COMPANY HAS! It would sound quite convincing. The poor chap will feel he/she is at serious risk, goes to the FAKE website, enters his/her old password and then a NEW password. The website then captures the old password which is still the ACTUAL password for that person's true credit card account.

Once this has occurred - someone begns to charge up lots of goods in your name.

The media and government complacency in telling people to NOT WORRY, VERY LITTLE CREDIT CARD INFORMATION IS IN THESE RECORDS - is astronomically unheard of. It doesn't matter if the person's credit card information and bank account information is within those discs. It is easily accessible just by having the information already on the discs.

If your basic information is sold to the right person - your entire credit situation AND bank accounts are up for grabs.

Take this seriously. Very seriously.

We do not have credit ourselves, we pay everything in cash and what credit we did have is so-so, we just have not used it in so long (we had unemployment in our lives and did not want to be living on credit we could not pay for).

I and my husband both worked in banking for a bit and are aware of these scams, we have gotten some of those phishing emails.

I worry about my mother who is now alone. My father was in and out of the VA and they did have credit together, however he is deceased and the records show that as well she paid off that credit card and closed it out. She had recently gotten some of those phishing calls and she was wise enough to ask then to call her back, they sort of harassed her and she told them if they were legitimate, they would not feel the need to pressure her. She then reported them to her bank, they helped her go over things to be sure she was protected.

I was concerned more for the actual service records for veterans. What kind of security levels they had and if that got into the wrong hands, who knows who it could be and what they would want with veterans who know classified info, that really had/has me concerned.

I won't say what kind of clearance I had for security reasons. What I can tell you is that what I have in my noggin will go to the grave with me should anyone desire to obtain it. I'm not saying I know anything too terribly important, but even if someone THINKS I do and attempts to get it, they may as well look for easier prey.

I don't take too kindly toward anyone who uses intimidation or threats, nor do I give in to torture.

They can forget it.

This morning they reported it was a laptop and that the theft occurred 19 days before it was released to the public. :twisted:

WHERE STOLEN ID DATA GOES

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Originally Posted by butterbean

This has all the information one would need to replace the original owners entire life. Everything! Birthdate, SS #, all Medical info from birth on, credit info. What more do they need to start a brand new life? Its eerie.

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Hi Butterbean,

The world's largest clearing house for stolen identity data is Bangalore, India, where workers (who now have America's jobs) enjoy immunity from any laws forbidding such theft.
http://www.indiadaily.com/images/editorial/4198_320.jpg

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Originally Posted by Liz Weston

Your best friend may not know how much you made last year or whether you’ve been late with a credit-card payment -- but an office worker in India might.

Tax returns, mortgage applications, even credit-bureau files are among the sensitive financial data that cost-conscious American firms are quietly shipping overseas. Consider:
As many as 500,000 U.S. tax returns could be prepared in India next year, says tax outsourcing expert Gary Boomer of Boomer Consulting in Manhattan, Kan. That’s up from about 25,000 in the 2002 tax year and 100,000 for 2003. The individual and business returns come from a wide range of U.S. sources, from single-CPA offices to Big Four accounting firms, including Ernst & Young and Deloitte.

TransUnion, one of the three major credit bureaus, plans to send all consumer disputes to a processing center in India. The company expects a significant increase in such disputes as U.S. consumers take advantage of a new law requiring bureaus to provide free annual credit reports, and says outsourcing the work is its most cost-effective option. Rival bureau Equifax currently outsources some dispute work to Jamaica. Credit-bureau files contain some of your most sensitive financial data, including your Social Security number, credit account numbers, the amounts you owe and your payment history.

U.S. companies are expected to outsource $3 billion this year in such “business processing,” which also includes insurance-claims handling, transcription of personal medical files and credit-card processing, according to research firm Gartner. That total represents a 65% increase from the year before. India, the Philippines and China are among the countries taking on the bulk of this work.

The mighty buck vs. your privacy
The motivator is simple: Money. Overseas processors often can do the work for a fraction of what it would cost domestically. For example, an accounting graduate who would earn $3,750 a month working for a Big Four firm in the United States earns about $300 a month in India. That allows Indian companies to charge U.S. accountants $75 to $150 per return, Boomer said. The U.S. preparer can turn around and bill the client for two to five times that amount.

And there’s no law that requires the U.S. accountant or firm to tell you that your return was prepared by someone else, let alone someone overseas. Likewise, most of the other business processing that’s handled abroad is done without the consumer’s knowledge or consent.

Privacy experts are understandably concerned about the risks your data may face overseas. Some of their worst fears were realized last year when a Pakistani medical transcriber threatened to post on the Internet confidential patient files from a San Francisco hospital unless she was paid money she said she was owed. ...

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Entire article:
http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/Ban ... P90682.asp

Gartner warning of ID thieft from India:
http://www.computing.co.uk/vnunet/news/ ... ndian-call

Horror of outsourcing to India - Indian call centers are illegally selling personal information
http://www.indiadaily.com/editorial/4198.asp

Lots of links to India's mis-handling of our identity information:
http://www.antioffshore.org/index.php?o ... 2&Itemid=2

Note: An American, who is victim to Identity Theft from India, "can" travel to India and sue the Indian firm. However, the lawsuit will take 10 years and the [American] victim is guaranteed to lose.

Never think this same horrible event won't happen to you. We are all at risk here. The internet itself, the computer, the storage of our information in large impersonal systems, has made it easy for mass identity theft of all kinds. Next you may hear of the theft of all the personal information and social security numbers of nurses, or cancer patients, or registered Democrats, or show dog owners, or the membership of AAA. Our identity is up for grabs, and/or likely to be sold to the highest bidder.

I find it strange that the government admits that illegal aliens steal the identities of ordinary citizens, but at the same time do nothing about it. The least the government could do is to send notice to the owner of that SS card. Then they should do everything possible to reconstruct the proper records of the legitemate holder, and issue him/her a new card.

A modest proposal: Maybe we need an additional safeguard? A form of verification to validate the use of the SS number. Let's say an individual got ahold of your SS number, but in order to claim benefits he would have to know your personal "SS validation number" which could be stored and cross-listed at another agency. Maybe you would be able to choose this number yourself, or maybe it would be significant some other way. The "validation number" wouldn't tossed about to every video store clerk, or dentists office where it is easily copied and "borrowed". So just knowing the SS number alone would not help a thief as much. As it stands now, the theft of your social security card can happen anytime and YOU are left holding the bag. Unfair!

You know that the government pays different "think tanks" to come up with solutions for various problems. Yet the same government has been putting every one of us at risk by requiring us to bear the consequences of a flawed system of financial identification they FORCE us to use.

This increasingly risky document needs to be made failsafe. And we should not be the ones who suffer if and when the document becomes compromised, as in theft of disks or records.

I wonder if there is cause here to sue or penalize the system which makes ID theft so easy, so tempting, and so profitable.

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This morning they reported it was a laptop and that the theft occurred 19 days before it was released to the public.

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If this is true then the Senate was aware of the theft when they decided to decriminalize the illegal immigrant use of stolen SS numbers.

OK, so just records after 1975? That let's my husband out - but my son would be included.

Now, my son says the radio station he was listening to said the system was 'hacked' and that's how they obtained the info.

I wonder what the real story is.

Also, if in fact it was either a computer or the discs, where were these that someone would have the ability to steal them?

Why would anyone be able to take these files to an unsafe location?

Are these the only copies of these files?

They may be going to use this to say we need a completely new system of ID.

So, gee, if we get a new system, then everyone will be legal and the illegals won't have to prove anything------

I think votenow1 hit the nail on the head. The senate are moving to make it perfectly okay to use someone elses SS number, no penalties, no charges, no nothing.

Then.....

nntrixie says maybe than use this for a rally for the need of a completely new system of ID.

My next thought is implanted Verichip. Microchips for everyone.

Far fetched?