Lawmakers Considering New Identity Theft Legislation for 2006
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ALBANY, N.Y. – For the past seven years, 25-year-old Denise Curro has tried unsuccessfully to get her credit restored after having her wallet and social security card stolen.
She’s been hounded by creditors looking for payment for goods and services she never ordered, including 48 accounts with just one electric and gas utility in North Carolina, her mother, Angela Curro of North Belmore, said. According to at least one credit agency, Ms. Curro has even been married to a man named Derontay Pettigrew.
“It’s nerve-wracking, time consuming, and very frustrating,” her mother said.” Every year we get a credit report and there is always something new.”
New York lawmakers are now considering legislation that would allow state residents to freeze their credit files. Security freezes block access to consumer credit reports and can prevent identity thieves from taking out new loans and credit under a victim’s name.
“We’re going to sit down to see how we can hash out a bill,” said a Republican state senator, Charles Fuschillo, himself a victim of identity theft two years ago. He said that as of January, 12 states will have credit file freeze laws on the books.
Mr. Fuschillo said freezing laws can help consumers further protect themselves from identity thieves, who use victims’ addresses, social security numbers, birthdates, and other information to set up phony accounts. The information can also be used to harass victims.
This summer, Governor Pataki signed a bill co-sponsored by Mr. Fuschillo requiring businesses and governments to make consumers aware of security breaches. The Legislature also passed bills to boost the penalties for identity theft and expand the list of personal identification information that is off-limits.
“However, only a security freeze gives New Yorkers the personal option to take preventative and proactive steps to stop identity thieves from using stolen personal information to get new credit or other new accounts in consumers’ names,” a programs director for the nonprofit Consumers Union, Charles Bell, told lawmakers at a public hearing on Monday held by Mr. Fuschillo and an Assembly member, Audrey Pheffer, a Queens Democrat.
