Identity Theft
Identity theft is a crime in which a person's personal data is illegally used for financial gain. The English term "Identity theft" appeared in 1964, and its Russian translation is inaccurate, as it is impossible to steal a person’s identity itself. I believe that the terminology in this case only complicates matters, and I suggest we practically consider what information is stolen and why.
What Information is Stolen
Photos, passport data, photocopies of documents, selfies with documents, copies of bank cards. You can find many offers to buy copies of passport data through search, and you might even come across your own among those for sale. We explain how to check your data for identity theft in this chapter of the course, and what to do in case of a leak in this one.
Why Digital Identity is Stolen
Fraud
You are a beautiful girl, you have a lovely face and a toned body, men linger on your Instagram for hours, and everything is fine until a fraudster comes for your identity. Your data and photos can adorn a profile on a dating site, from which prepayment will then be extorted from men wishing to meet you.
One of these schemes works as follows: a beautiful girl, behind whose account is a fraudster, meets a man on a dating site who is assigned the role of the victim. Using template phrases and messages, the perpetrator initiates a relationship that ends with an invitation to the movies. But this is not an ordinary cinema; it’s tickets for private seats where they can watch a movie just the two of them. How can one refuse such an offer?
Such tickets are sold on a special website and are provided as a special service in cinemas. The site offers the option to pay by card, the possibility of a refund for tickets an hour before the start, and other pleasant moments for the buyer. There is only one small nuance - the site belongs to the fraudster, and after payment, the money will go into the criminal's pocket, while the "beauty" will stop communicating.
There are other ways to monetize: photos in swimsuits are perfect for a fraudulent intimate services website, and if your acquaintances end up on it, you will have to spend a long time explaining the story of your photos and data being stolen.