A 35-year-old help desk employee has been sentenced to 14 years for Identity Theft. Philip Cummings stole personal information from more than 30,000 customers and then passed that information onto criminals. Losses to the victims are estimated at $50-$100 million.

BBC

He would steal people's credit reports and pass them on to an accomplice, who would sell them on and share the profits with Cummings.

The stolen identities, bought by intermediaries for about $60 per name, were then used to access the victims' bank accounts and use their credit cards.

The criminals would buy expensive goods, including computers and electronic equipment, and resell them to other members of the network.

By changing a customer's personal details, the thieves could even have new credit and ATM cards mailed directly to them

If you think this is bad, wait until they find all the ID theft happening in India. With all the outsourced data they have access to -- including medical records, credit card data, bank account information, tax returns and US government data -- it wouldn't be hard. On top of that consider the average pay for a worker over there and the un-accountability and you have a recipe for disaster. It's bound to happen sooner or later and it will be on a much larger scale than you see above.

Tipped by: Slashdot