finally, someone's saying it.

gragh. this was supposed to be monday's post. anyway.

finally, someone has come up and pointed out that identity theft exists because there's a whole industry that depends on the same things that make it possible.

Why isn't this brutally simple and effective solution more widespread? Simply put, it disrupts the free flow of credit information on which consumer lenders and data sellers depend.

To be fair, big banks and other credit-card issuers, retailers and data peddlers aren't the only ones who thrive on the ready accessibility of information. You benefit too: It's never been easier to get a credit card, find a mortgage or buy a car. ...

This is what no one acknowledges about identity theft: that there's a conflict of interest between the consumer and the system.

the middle class in this country is drowning in debt, partly because of easily available credit. as he rightly points out, it has never been easier to get a credit card. my question is, however, is this a benefit? how many people use credit cards to live beyond their means? and then the banks make even more money by charging their exorbitant interest rates and fees and so on.

another article offers this viewpoint:

In Utah, a credit-freeze bill was defeated on the last day of the legislative session after car dealers argued it would hurt their business, says Laura Polacheck, associate state director of AARP Utah, which lobbied in favor of the bill.

The car dealers "said 90% of their customers decide to buy a car and want to open credit the same day," she says. "It was enough to kill the bill."

now, my question is, who wakes up one morning and says, "i'm going to finance a car today"? usually, spending upwards of $20,000 isn't exactly an impulse buy. so you know you need a new car, and you give yourself the 3 days to unfreeze your credit report so you can finance that car. yes, i know there are always exceptions to the person who can wait 3 days before buying a car, but is that enough to scuttle a bill that would protect the majority of the population from identity theft?

i am 100% in the camp that says that companies ought to notify you if your information has been compromised. i check my credit card balances online. why, when i went to the websites last night, there was no "by the way, the CardSystems database did/did not include your account"? how hard is it to add that to a website?

everyone, but especially the financial industry, needs to sit up and take responsibility for what their eagerness to turn a buck is doing to this country. once your identity is stolen, you're fucked. it's so easy to get credit because our credit reports are so easily accessed, but it's next to impossible to protect against not only the possible abuses of that system, but also to resurrect one's standing once the abuse is perpetrated. not only do we need to allow credit freezes, but we need to make it easier to clear the customer's name once fraud takes place. if an industry is going to build its business model on something so blatantly abusive to its customers, then they wholly deserve to be forced to curb those abuses.