Sadly, and disturbingly, a lot of identity thieves don’t learn their lesson the first time, even after they have served jail time for their crimes. For example, Robert Delgado of California was already on parole for identity theft when police found personal information for over 300,000 individuals on his computer. He came up with quite a scam, on which he was recently convicted and sentenced. He forged credit cards and government identification – so he could ‘prove’ that the cards were his of course – and used the cards to purchase expensive items, which he would later resell.
Even with all this planning, this hero to identity thieves had a fatal flaw: he listed his real cell phone number on his Facebook page. With this information, and one of his victims as an informant, authorities were able to track his location using the GPS on his phone. That is what led them to his computer. They also had video surveillance footage from a Lowe’s store that helped prove Delgado had committed his crimes.
Two lessons of note from this story. The first is that identity thieves don’t always give up, even if they have served jail time previously. Delgado got sentenced to eight years for this stint, but that doesn’t mean he won’t try again when he gets out. And, actually, sometimes identity thieves are aided and abetted by people currently in prison.
The second lesson is kind of a funny one, since it ultimately aided in this thief’s downfall, but still it is a lesson nonetheless: don’t list your phone number on your Facebook page or any other social networking site. While it helped in this case, it also highlighted how easily someone can locate you if you do so, even if said person is not your Facebook ‘friend.’
Do you remember how many victims Delgado potentially had? It was in the hundreds of thousands, and that is with a pretty simple scheme. Can you see how easily there are 10 million victims of identity theft in this country every year? Can you tell why it’s so important to look into an identity theft protection plan? While big stories like this always make the news, there are a lot of thieves out there that never get caught. Be proactive and stay safe!