Posted on 08/06/2002 11:04:42 AM PDT by Stand Watch Listen
Al-Qaeda terrorist cells hiding in Spain used stolen credit cards to make numerous purchases, being careful to keep their spending below levels at which identification would be needed, according to the FBI. Extensive use of false passports and travel documents were used to open bank accounts where money for the mujahideen movement was sent to and from countries that include Pakistan and Afghanistan, according to Dennis Lormel, chief of the FBI's Terrorist Financial Review Group, in July testimony before the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on Technology, Terrorism and Government Information.
The FBI is using data-mining software to trace identity-theft activity, expecting that illegal use of stolen identification such as Social Security numbers (SSNs) will lead back to terrorists in the United States. According to Lormel, the FBI is tracking SSNs that have been identified in both current and past terrorism investigations.
Once identifiers such as SSNs are verified, Lormel said, investigators track the numbers through the records of immigration authorities, the military, departments of motor vehicles and other government or fee-based databases. Incidents of suspected misuse then are separated according to type, bundled into investigative packages and forwarded to the appropriate investigative and prospective teams for follow-up.
At a separate hearing, American Bar Association (ABA) officials also testified that identity theft is on the rise. Boris Melnikoff, a member of the ABA Fraud Prevention and Oversight Council, told the Senate Special Committee on Aging, "As technology and the Internet have made more information readily available ? for better or for worse ? we have redoubled our efforts to help educate consumers about how to prevent and resolve cases of identity theft. Banks and our customers are partners in protecting information."
But John and Mary Elizabeth Stevens are dubious about consumer education as a solution to identity theft, having been fighting such crime on their own without the resources of a government agency or industry technology. Indeed, they charge, "Identity theft is only possible with the full cooperation of three major participants: the impostor, the creditor and the credit bureau. All are coconspirators and equally guilty of identity theft." They also dispute industry claims that credit-card companies are victims of these crimes, calling them coconspirators as well.
According to these activists, "The perpetuation of identity theft has created a new product line for the credit bureaus, which now sell services alerting cardholders to significant changes on their credit reports." As John Stevens, a retired U.S. Air Force pilot, told the Senate Special Committee on Aging at a July hearing, "Protecting the integrity and ensuring the accuracy of information contained in a credit report should be a normal part of their operation and not just available to those willing to pay them for protection." Stevens says he spent much of his military career designing electronic-warfare aircraft and flying combat missions.
Since 1997, however, he and his wife have spent their retirement fighting the impostors who used their SSNs to open 33 fraudulent accounts on which the perpetrators charged $113,000. But, for all the government's gadgetry and electronic investigating in response to the terrorist acts of Sept. 11, Stevens proposes low-tech responses that almost anyone can use to detect likely SSN fraud. He also thinks access to SSNs must be better protected by the Social Security Administration (SSA), and that the numbers might best be restricted to Social Security purposes instead of used as a national identifier.
In lieu of returning the exclusivity of the SSN back to the SSA, agency Inspector General James Huse Jr. has called for legislative strengthening to help prevent identity theft. "We cannot return the SSN to its original limited function. Because of the complex ways in which the SSN is used today, we must make steps to limit its use and to limit the expansion of its use," he says.
Huse urged expanded access to SSN validation as a way to facilitate verification. "Congress should consider requiring the cross-verification of SSNs through both governmental and private-sector systems of records," he says. "Only in such a way can we combat and limit the spread of false identification and SSN misuse." He also wants to give police officers, especially those making traffic stops, the same SSN verification access as employers use to verify worker status.
But others say the technology that gave government easier access to private information is in fact responsible for the epidemic of identity theft. Even the Department of Justice (DOJ) has warned of the insider problem caused by too many employees having too much access to personal information on citizens. In 1997, Michael R. Bromwich, then inspector general of the DOJ, testified to a Senate caucus on international narcotics control that drug traffickers along the borders and through ports of entry had targeted financially vulnerable government employees to obtain immigration documents involving identity theft of U.S. citizens.
Little wonder the Stevenses are suspicious of those asking for expanded verification databases. They suggest instead that a bit more diligence might be encouraged when Social Security cards are presented. Stevens listened cordially as he shared the witness table with the federal experts and industry analysts expounding elaborate plans for biometric identifiers and authentication technology. He then quietly pointed out one low-tech verifier that he said would be effective in deterring SSN fraud: a simple understanding of the SSN itself.
According to the SSA, the first three digits of every Social Security number denote the area or ZIP code in the state where the application was filed. Prior to 1973, SSNs were assigned by field offices and the number reflected the state where the card was issued, starting with the lower numbers in the East and increasing geographically westward. A question or two about where the SSN was obtained might be a good place for a banker or retailer to start.
But it is the middle two digits that could be most helpful in authenticating a Social Security cardholder. These follow the geographically based three-digit area number. SSA officials point out that, for administrative reasons, the two middle digits are not assigned in a sequential order within a geographical area. The group numbers are given first in odd-numbered pairs "01" up to "09," then they switch to even-numbered pairs "10" up to "98." Once exhausted, the pair order reverses, starting with even-numbered pairs "02" through "08" before reverting to odd-numbered pairs of digits from "11" to "99." All the while the group numbers are followed by another set of four-digit serial numbers.
It sounds complicated, but SSA publishes on its Website a monthly issuance table that lists the highest area and group numbers assigned in a given region. So, John Stevens explains, a 20-year-old with low SSN middle digits that might match the chronological assignment pattern for someone much older who lives in the region should be fairly easy to verify by a utility company, bank or creditor, as would an SSN that is too high to be valid. And for that the only technology needed would be access to the Internet.
Meanwhile, Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho, the ranking Republican of the Senate Special Committee on Aging, is cosponsoring legislation with Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif), Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) to toughen penalties for aggravated identity theft. Presiding over a hearing on the impact of identity theft on the elderly, Craig pointed out that more than 700,000 Americans each year are victimized by identity theft. He calls this crime, which uses the good credit and careful spending of the targets to destroy their independence and security, a particularly insidious crime.
According to Lormel, the threat is made more serious by the fact that terrorists have become experts at identity theft and SSN fraud to enable them to obtain cover employment and access to secure locations. There is virtually no means of obtaining identification that has not at some level been exploited by these groups, he says.
Sheila R. Cherry is a writer for Insight.
It will require AI techniques to uncover these patterns, but they will be uncovered and will reliably lead back to the terrorists. As I constantly say, the channels used by illegal immigrants are the same used by terrorists. The channels must be closed to both or we will have a 'sum of all fears' situation.
That such easy loopholes still remain after 9-11 and that our borders and the visa holders are not minimally secured, is a crime itself.
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