WASHINGTON – Fraud and identity theft complaints rose last year in Maryland, leaving more than 10,000 victims around the state who were hit up for millions of dollars in 2003, the Federal Trade Commission reported Thursday.
The FTC said there were 4,124 reports of identity theft in the state in 2003, up from 3,497 a year earlier, and at least 5,931 cases of fraud, up from 4,131.
The 31.8 percent increase in those crimes in Maryland slightly outpaced the nation, which saw the total for those crimes rise 27.9 percent, from about 404,000 to 516,740.
And FTC officials said it is getting harder to track those criminals, because so many of the scams use the Internet.
J. Howard Beales III, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said 55 percent of the cases reported nationally were Internet-related. That can mean the consumer was solicited via e-mail, saw an ad online, contacted a company electronically after seeing a print ad — or that the entire transaction took place on the Internet.
“Clearly, computers and the Internet have become a common part of the consumer experience. An interesting side note is that more consumers’ complaints we received last year came via the Web,” Beales said.
Caroline Henneman, chief of Criminal Investigations Division of Maryland Attorney General’s Office, said her office has seen an increase in the number of identity theft complaints — but that does not mean there have been more prosecutions.
“Most of the cases are not prosecutable because we don’t know who did it,” Henneman said — although she could not say how many cases have been prosecuted in the state, because most are handled by county prosecutors.
In Maryland, the FTC said that more than one-third of all fraud complaints were related to Internet auctions or services last year. Henneman said thieves are even using fears about Internet scams as another way to scam people.
Henneman cited the example of a recent fraud that involves an e-mail that appears to come from a bank, informing the recipient about suspicions of fraudulent activity. It then directs them to give up personal information, including PIN numbers, to verify the accounts are in order.
Identity theft — where stolen personal information is used to commit fraud — can be committed by anyone from the baby-sitter who got a credit card number from the home where she worked to criminal organizations that buy and sell information that can be passed on for years.
Maryland reported 74.9 identity theft cases per 100,000 people last year, improving the state’s ranking from ninth-worst rate in the nation in 2002 to 11th-worst in 2003.
But the state regressed slightly in its fraud ranking for the year. There were 107.7 fraud cases reported for every 100,000 people in Maryland in 2003, moving the state to 13th-worst in the nation, one step down from 14th-worst in 2002.
The FTC said the Washington, D.C., area, which includes the Maryland suburbs, had the highest fraud rate in the nation last year, with 153.4 complaints per 100,000 people.
The fraud claims in Maryland alone cost at least $8.8 million last year. The number would have been higher, but almost a quarter of the people who reported being victimized were able to recoup their money or stop payment before they were burned, the FTC said.
The frauds related to Internet auctions, shop-at-home and catalog-sales, Internet services, advance-free loans and foreign money offers, the FTC said. Identity-theft cases involved misdirected government benefits and misuse of people’s personal information to fraudulently get loans, run up credit card bills and use phone and other utility accounts.
Beales said people must be extremely careful to protect their money and their personal information to keep both from falling into the wrong hands. Just giving a credit card to a waiter in a restaurant could open the door to an identity theft case, he said.
Steve Sakamoto-Wengel, assistant attorney general in the state’s Consumer Protection Division, said people should check financial statements monthly and destroy all documents containing personal information. They should not do business on any Web site without first verifying who is on the other side of the computer, he said.
-30- CNS 01-22-04