The crime of ID-theft can come in many flavors. In fact, it wasn't even considered a federal crime until 1998. The formal definition comes from the Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act which describes it as being a crime for someone “to knowingly use, transfer, produce or possess another person's identification with the intent to commit a crime; or an implement that is used to create false documents; or an identification document or a false identification document.”

Identity thieves can commit any number of crimes depending on the type of theft including identification fraud, credit card fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud, financial institution fraud, computer fraud and bank fraud.

To track the complaints about ID-theft and consumer fraud, the FTC developed a complaint database called the Consumer Sentinel. A summary of the data in the Consumer Sentinel is published once a year. Some of the published facts and figures about ID-theft are:

Over the past five years, the number of ID-theft complaints to the FTC has risen almost 700%.

• In 2000, there were 31,117 complaints
• In 2001, there were 86,212 complaints
• In 2002, there were 161, 836 complaints
• In 2003, there were 214,905 complaints
• In 2004, there were 246,570 complaints

Surveys suggest that very few victims actually report ID-theft to the FTC. The FTC estimates that there may have been as many as 10 million victims of some form of identity theft in the past year.

ID-theft was again the #1 FTC complaint category in 2004, representing 39% of all complaints. The next three highest complaint categories were:

• 16% = Internet Auctions
• 12% = Shop at Home, Catalog Sales
• 6% = Internet Services and Computer Complaints
• 6% = Foreign Money Offers

The highest reported type of fraud in 2004 was Credit Card Fraud, representing 28% of all ID-theft complaints.The other types of fraud were:

• 19 % = Phone/Utilities Fraud
• 18% = Bank Fraud
• 13% = Employment-Related Fraud
• 8% = Government Documents or Benefits Fraud
• 5 % = Loan Fraud
• 22 % = Other Fraud
• 6% = Attempted Identity Theft

Arizona had the highest number of reported ID-theft victims as a percentage of their total population. California had the highest total number of Identity Theft victims (43,839) who filed a complaint with the FTC.

The next three states with the highest number of victims were:

• 26,454 = Texas
• 17,680 = New York
• 16,062 = Florida

To see more statistics, click here to open National and State Trends in Fraud and Identity Theft, January - December 2004, Federal Trade Commission. Published February 1, 2005. This is a summary of data based on complaints made to the FTC, and includes state-by-state data.

In 2003, the FTC also sponsored a broad survey to assess the overall impact of ID-theft. Click here to open the FTC's report on the results of that survey.