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Article: Consumer Assistance Needed to Help Fight Identity Theft.
- Article from:
- Information Technology Newsweekly
- Article date:
- July 21, 2009
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$60 billion was lost and 35.6 million consumer records were exposed in 2008 due to data breaches and identity theft, a 47% increase over 2007, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center. The U.S. Department of Justice reports that identity theft has surpassed the illegal drug trade as the number one crime in the nation. In response, federal agencies have mandated "Red Flag Rules" under the Fair and Accurate Credit Transaction Act of 2003, and Massachusetts enacted the most stringent consumer protection law in the nation, 201 CMR 17.00.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) estimates that many of the 11 million businesses affected by Red Flags are unaware of the ...