6A NEWS
CRIME
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAS
MONDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2006
Identity theft creates problems for students, universities
BY JACK WEINSTEIN
Jenni Henslee had some difficulty when she went to sign her lease last year. The credit check application she had filled out came back as someone else's social security number.
She was shocked.
The Shawnee junior thought she had written down the wrong number so she called her mom to make sure. The number was right. Someone had stolen her identity.
Police told Henslee that a woman had obtained her social security number when she was 16 and had used it for several years, destroying Henslee's credit. Henslee's social security number now has a red flag, making it difficult to do simple things like getting an apartment or getting her utilities turned on.
Through March 2006, 212 cases of identity theft have been reported
in Lawrence, said Sgt. Dan Ward of the lawrence Police Department
Universities and businesses are some of the groups most susceptible to breach. Jane Rosenthal, privacy coordinator and custodian of records at the KU Privacy Office, said that of those entities, 30 percent of breaches were institutions of higher education.
Identity theft is the fastest growing crime in the U.S. for the sixth year in a row, said Todd Davis, CEO of LifeLock, an Arizona company that helps its customers avoid becoming the victims of identity theft. LifeLock is the biggest company of its kind.
Davis said there were 115 cases of data breach at 85 universities in the past 18 months. Davis added that two of those cases had occurred at the University of Kansas.
Rosenthal said one of those instances could have been when an unsecured page on a Department
of Student Housing Web site was breached last December, but she couldn't say for sure. Housing officials said at the time that none of the compromised information was accessed.
"You're 25 times more likely to have your identity stolen than your car stolen," Davis said. "We lock our cars, insure our cars; we need to do the same with our identities."
Davis said criminals can gain access to private information in a number of ways.
He said 50 percent of the time someone the victim does business with loses the information. About 16 percent of the time, credit card information is stolen by a waiter or bartender when a tab is opened and 16 percent of the time identity theft is from dumpster diving or digging through trash. The rest of the time, about 18 percent, a family member or friend steals the information.
On college campuses, databases can be hacked into to get information. Mail, especially pre-approved credit card offers, can be stolen. College students should also be careful what they put on popular social networks like Facebook and MySpace, Davis said.
The University has taken steps to alert students, faculty and staff to the dangers of identity theft and how to prevent it, including making anyone with a KU e-mail address change the password once a semester.
The Privacy Office was established in part to help educate the KU community about the dangers of identity theft and what to do if one's identity has been stolen. At www.privacyku.edu, students, faculty and staff can use the resources on the Web site to avoid becoming a victim of identity theft.
"We're taking a more global approach," Rosenthal said. "KU is
at the forefront of that. Not many universities have privacy offices yet."
Davis said anyone could avoid becoming a victim of identity theft. He recommended setting fraud alerts with any of the three major credit bureaus, Equifax, Experian or TransUnion. Fraud alerts allow potential victims to monitor their credit reports and the company will let them know if any new accounts have been opened. Alerts last for 90 days and one company will notify the others if unusual activity is detected. He also recommends opting out of all pre-approved credit card offers by calling (888) 50PT-OUT. By doing that, one's name is removed from all lists bought by companies to obtain personal information for five years.
By doing those things, Davis said it would be difficult for criminals to use personal information if they gained access to it.
"It's unrealistic to think that
criminals can't get our information," Davis said. "The key is making that information useless."
Davis said if people set up fraud alerts and opt out of all pre-approved credit card offers, then identity theft would go away.
As for Henslee, she still has to send all of her personal information to the Social Security Administration to get her identity back. She's going to get a credit card to establish her own line of credit, but putting up with some of the headaches as a result of having her identity stolen is something she may have to deal with for the rest of her life.
"Hopefully, it will get better," she said.
Kansan staff writer Jack Weinstein can be contacted at jweinstein@ kansan.com.
Edited by Aly Barland
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HEARING (CONTINUED FROM 1A)
She said during her testimony that Bernard told her to kiss him after she asked Bernard where her underwear and palama pants were located.
She left her residence hall room and went to a friend's room, where she discovered vaginal bleeding. She went to the bathroom three times to try and stop the bleeding, she said.
According to a KU Public Safety office report, the woman also sustained minor injuries. A friend and a McCollum resident assistant took the woman to Lawrence Memorial
Bernard's attorney, Greg Robinson, probed the woman's memories, dwelling on the amount of alcohol she consumed and how she often couldn't clearly recall details from what she allegedly told staff at the hospital.
Hospital, located at 325 Maine St.
Bernard allegedly told her she took her own clothes off, the woman answered. She conceded it was possible, but that she had never done such a thing before.
Robinson questioned how her memory was fuzzy before she fell asleep and only became clear when she woke up half naked, still allegedly in bed with Bernard. He asked her if she had taken her own clothes off while under the influence of alcohol.
The hearing will conclude Nov. 1 with test results and testimony from hospital officials.
Kansan staff writer David Linhardt can be contacted at dlinhardt@ kansan.com.
Edited by Kristen Jarboe
CRIME (CONTINUED FROM 1A)
arrests had been made.
She screamed and the man ran away. The woman described the man as a white male, 160 to 200 lbs, wearing blue jeans. As of Sunday, no
On Oct. 12, someone sexually attacked a female KU student walking near the intersection of 12th and Tennessee streets. A man allegedly shoved her to the ground and groped her, according to a Lawrence police press release.
As of Sunday afternoon, police are still looking for the suspects. Geis and other witnesses described them as a black male in his early 20s and a
Geis won't soon forget his experience last week. Two suspects forced Geis and his friends at gunpoint to empty their pockets and lie down. They allegedly took cell phones, wallets and even the poker chips.
stocky Native American or Hispanic man in his early 20s.
Lawrence Police asks anyone with details about these crimes to call the tips hotline at 843-TIPS.
Kansan staff writer David Linhardt can be contacted at dlinhardt@ kansan.com.
Edited by Catherine Odson
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