Interview with an Identity Theif

["Dude VanWinkle" <dudevanwinkle () gmail com>]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/04/us/04identity.html

By the time of Shiva Brent Sharma's third arrest for identity theft,
at the age of 20, he had taken in well over $150,000 in cash and
merchandise in his brief career. After a certain point, investigators
stopped counting.

<snip>

"It's an addiction, no doubt about that," said Mr. Sharma, who
inflected his words with the sort of street cadence adopted by smart
kids trying to be cool. "I get scared that when I get out, I might
have a problem and relapse because it would be so easy to take $300
and turn it into several thousand."

That ease accounts for the sizable ranks of identity-fraud victims,
whose acquaintance with the crime often begins with unexplained credit
card charges, a drained bank account or worse. The victims' tales have
become alarmingly familiar, but usually lack a protagonist — the
perpetrator. Mr. Sharma's account of his own exploits provides the
missing piece: an insight into both the tools and the motivation of a
persistent thief.


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Video here: http://nytimes.feedroom.com/?fr_story=9c85e051a6f57027e55df9419441b85352648010

-JP<who is glad his credit sux and doesnt have a CC>

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