Identity Theft Still a Huge Issue for Consumers According to FTC Data; Programming Note
Written by Shari R. Pogach, Regulatory Paralegal
Identity theft continues to be a huge problem for consumers. According to the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) annual summary of consumer complaints in its Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book for January December 2015, identity theft complaints were the second most reported by consumers in 2015. And, identity theft complaints increased more than 47 percent from 2014. The identity theft complaints dealt with: 45 percent were related to tax or wage ID theft, 2) 16 percent concerned credit card fraud and 3) 10 percent were related to phones or utilities.
The top ten complaint categories for 2015:
- Debt Collection
- Identity Theft
- Impostor Scams
- Telephone and Mobile Services
- Prizes, Sweepstakes and Lotteries
- Banks and Lenders
- Shop-at-Home and Catalog Sales
- Auto-Related Complaints
- Television and Electronic Media
- Credit Bureaus, Information Furnishers and Report Users
Consumers also continue to complain about financial institutions with such complaints making up 4 percent of the total of 3,083,379 complaints collected in 2015. Complaints regarding financial institutions ranged from: Deceptive or predatory mortgage lending practices; problems with modification of mortgage terms; miscellaneous customer service and account issues with bank or credit union products, including payday loans, student loans, auto title loans, fees and overdraft charges; other finance company lending products, services and practices; etc.
The FTC's data book breaks down the top ten consumer complaints by state and then the top six identity theft type complaints by state. Florida, Georgia and Michigan were the top three states for fraud and other complaints. Missouri, Connecticut and Florida were the top three states for identity theft complaints. This data comes from consumer complaints made directly to the FTC as well as those received by state and federal law enforcement agencies, national consumer protection organizations and non-governmental organizations.
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Programming Note. It's time for school! Your compliance questions will be answered but we appreciate your patience as the team will be in and out of the office giving presentations this week at NAFCU's 2016 Regulatory Compliance School. And, be sure to send out good luck wishes to those attendees testing to obtain their NAFCU Certified Compliance Officer (NCCO) designation.