Ifsm 201 Research Paper

1110 Words5 Pages
IDENTITY THEFT AS AN ETHICAL ISSUE As information technology improves, protecting personal information becomes more and more important, especially for personally Identifiable Information (PII). Identity Theft is one of the ethical issues related to the use of PII. Any kinds of crime related to the loss of PII can be identity theft. In the past ten years, the trend of identity theft is on the rise. Saleh said that identity theft had become the second most frequently crime in IC3 complaint categories in 2011(Saleh, 2013, p. 9). This crime can happen in different kinds of pattern, but a large scale identity theft happens probably the most frequently. Incidents of identity theft can pose great risk to anyone, and the cost can be very heavy. There are negative impacts by the issue such as loss of confidence in the security and fraudulent tax refunds. Because of that, related policies and insurances are adopted to reduce the crimes. Although identity theft has become a threatening ethical issue related to information technology, people can learn lessons behind this ethical issue, and find ways to protect PII and reduce the negative impacts of identity theft. Many people still have confusion on the definition of identity theft and the related impacts. So what is an identity theft? When a burglar steals the key of a house, he can go inside very easily and take everything away in the house. Similarly, stealing PII is like stealing the key of personal asset. When a hacker steals our PII such as social security number and bank account number, he is conducting an identity theft. Schreft says that “Identity theft involves the theft of elements of a person’s identifying characteristics” (Schreft, 2007, p. 9). Identity theft crimes are increasing by the day, and this ethical issue has negative impacts on many people’s lives. According to Schreft, “In 2007, data breaches at
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