My legal identity was stolen

Review

On Saturday morning, I slept well, got up and made a cup of coffee, intending to finish writing this week's Web3 study notes, when I suddenly received a call from an unfamiliar number. Originally, I never answered unknown calls, but just this week, the computer was sent for repair . The owner said that he would call if there was a problem, so he saw the local phone number and answered it.

The caller said it was a salesman from JPMorgan Chase Bank. I said that I didn't have an account with Morgan Bank, so I wanted to hang up, but the caller repeatedly confirmed my name and phone number, and said that I opened a credit card in Guangzhou on February 11 this year. , how much is the card number, and spend 8540 yuan to buy an Apple computer, overdue payment, call to remind. In fact, in the conversations he kept going back and forth, the amount of consumption was a little different, and I was a little wary, but when I thought that someone fraudulently used my name to open an account in Guangzhou for consumption, I became nervous and quickly asked for details. I said that I have always been in the United States, and I have never been to Guangzhou, nor have I opened an account there. Someone must have taken my name. He said that this matter should be reported to the Guangzhou police station, and the police station will issue a report certificate before they can freeze the account and exempt me from responsibility. So he transferred me to the police station (!!) Why can the bank transfer me to the police station, and the phone number has not changed? ? ! ! As smart as I am, because I wanted to track down the person who used my identity to open an account , I believed that I was talking to the police! ! 😂

After that, he started to take a statement, make a transcript, ask for personal information and so on... In order to prove his identity, he also added my WeChat and sent me his ID picture, as shown in the following picture:

During the conversation, I gave my Chinese ID number, US driver's license number, passport number, passport issuance and expiration date, social security number, and home address. 🥲😂🥲😂🥲😂 He also asked me the model of my phone and the current battery, and I did as I said 🤦‍♀️

Then he said to report my information to headquarters and started scanning my information.

I may have seen a lot of the looming situation of 1984 in Shanghai recently, and I actually believe that the citizen surveillance of a powerful country can track suspects who may steal my identity based on my mobile phone model and identity information... Information technology practitioners think beautifully!

Then he talked to his "sir" for a while, and then turned around and shouted alarmistly: Did you hide something from me? !

He said that they had found a financial criminal who had been wanted for more than a year. He had my account book in his hand, and there were millions of stolen funds in the account (I wanted to ask if it was US dollars or RMB, but I held back.) He said their plainclothes police in the US had only recently found the criminal's hideout and found 700 ledgers in it, one of which was mine. The criminal has confessed that I was an accomplice, saying that I was poor and could not live in the United States, so he opened an account in HSBC and sold it to the criminal at a high price to accept the stolen money.

"Excuse me? I pay taxes every year in the U.S., okay? You'll find out if you check with the IRS." I was very dissatisfied with the fact that he said that I was so poor that I wanted to sell my account , but I didn't realize that this story was made up. how rotten

Him: Anyway, you opened the account and gave it to the criminal...

Me: I have never opened this account, let alone given it to anyone...

Him: Just relying on your dictation is useless. It is impossible for me to believe you as soon as you say it.

Me: So I'm asking you to record a statement! You record first and then check.

He: You citizens, the identity information issued to you by the state is not carefully kept, and you have handled so many businesses online that your identity information is exposed. Now this account is in your name, if you can’t show evidence that you did not open this account , in the end the blame is on you.

Me: I understand that. So I'm cooperating with you to take notes. When you're done, go ahead and investigate.

It should be said that I am stupid and stupid . It is true that I was caught in the weak spot, and I was worried that I would encounter the identity theft, but he said that I was not afraid at all. I am grateful that I live in a society with a high degree of trust: I once swiped a credit card of 80 US dollars for consumption. I don’t remember it. When I checked the account, I thought someone had stolen the swipe. Ask more, immediately froze my credit card and refunded the $80 to me. Thanks to this experience, I was not intimidated by him, but believed in the justice of the banking process. This "police officer" has a lot of bullshit. He repeatedly told me how serious the disclosure of my identity was, and tried to accuse me of something wrong. I didn't give in, just said:

Officer, I will not plead guilty. Your logic now is to blame the victim. You remind me of women who have been sexually assaulted and come to report the case. Instead of arresting the perpetrators, you blame women for their own problems .

I also read too much social news and feel angry in my heart 😂  …

He said that I was quibbling, and he said that 17 victims have transferred their life savings to his account, and some committed suicide because of this. Do you know that you are in trouble? !

I said, according to the logic that your victims are wrong, why don't you say that these 17 victims themselves have to listen to slander, be deceived, and give money to criminals? They were deceived because they were not careful. It is the same reason that I accidentally leaked personal privacy. Can you please keep your logic consistent ?

( Why should I go to a swindler with a low level of education and limited imagination to have a theoretical and logical self-consistency?!! He will only make up stories according to his own actual actions!! 🤦‍♀️😅)

He threatened me not to contradict the investigators. At one point I was asked to plead guilty, and at another point I was asked to assist in handling the case. I thought for a while and said:

Then I'll give you a clue. There is no such thing as a ledger when opening an account in a US bank, and all account information is on the computer network. You just said you found 700 books in the criminal's house, tell me what the books look like?

I also thought about it in my mind. If he was talking about the paper ledger from decades ago, 700, how big and difficult to manage? If you don't know how to get a database, let's get an Excel!

He suddenly became irritable and hung up the phone. At that moment, I finally came to my senses: he is not a policeman at all!

( Although he said a lot of nonsense in the foreword, I never doubted his identity as a police officer, which may also show that I don’t have high expectations for the quality of the strong country’s police... 😂 )

stop loss

After reacting to the fact that I gave so much ID information, I was paralyzed and rushed to my neighbor Avril's house to suppress my shock. Fortunately, she stabilized me, quietly listened to me reviewing what happened just now, and then helped me to find a bunch of URLs for reporting identity theft (applicable to the United States):

• First go to https://www.identitytheft.gov/ to fill out a form to report that your identity information was collected. That way, if someone uses your identity to apply for a loan or for other criminal activity, the Justice Department and the police have records that can help you file a complaint.
• If you don't know who the thief is, or what the thief did with your identity, don't call the police . The police will not accept it.
• Go to Credit Karma and set up fraud alerts at your various banks . This way, if someone does something in your name, you will be warned immediately.
• Go to the three major Credit Bureaus to freeze your credit: TransUnion , Equifax , Experian . This one I only freeze the first two. Financial institutions cannot provide you with a loan until you unfreeze it. If you are preparing for a loan recently, it will be more troublesome.

After I calmed down, I went back to my home and went to WeChat to report the fraudster's account (I still have to ask Leviathan for help at the critical moment 😅), and I and "Officer Chen Wen" were posted on WeChat Moments. screenshots of conversations, and warn friends and family to be wary of anyone trying to contact them in my name.

There are other alternative preventive measures, including buying identity theft insurance, reporting to the employer's information security department, going to the consulate to speak...etc. This evening, I reviewed this matter with friends from all walks of life, and the final conclusion is that I have done all the precautions that can be done, and it may not be a problem. The target of this scammer doesn't seem to be stealing my identity information - after all, to forge my legal identity to take out loans or do illegal activities, many related documents need to be forged, and this gentleman's rank doesn't seem to be that high. After listening to a few friends sharing their similar experiences, I think the trick of this type of scam is to intimidate me first, and then trick me into transferring money to him for peace of mind. If he was just trying to steal my identity information, he would have hung up long ago. He chatted with me for nearly two hours, but he still couldn't induce me into the trap of panic confession.

Summarize

When this happens, it's easy to blame yourself. My anxiety about identity theft was secondary, and more because my self-esteem was very uncomfortable. I wondered how I could chat with a scammer for two hours, and finally spend a night looking for comfort and stop losses. But a very successful private entrepreneur friend in the technology industry told me that he had also been deceived, and he had really defrauded thousands of RMB. nothing.

Nothing.

If you can't live with yourself, it's really worth the loss.

Ethereum was also corrupted by more than half of its minerals back then, what am I?

A few days ago, I was discussing the meaning of legal names with several friends (netizens). I said, my chat ID is my real name, but I don't know who you are, which makes me feel very exposed, and I don't know if there is a basis of trust between us. At the end of the day, does knowing the legal name provide a basis for trust? (He is right, is "Officer Chen Wen" more trustworthy than "Flower Bunny"??)

In recent years, domestic control has become more and more strict, and many people have felt the danger of being monitored, so they do not want to leave their names. In fact, the same is true in the United States. With the frequent cases of user data leakage from major companies such as Facebook, more and more people are reluctant to provide personal information. In the early years, the idea that everyone hoped that every Google search would be their glorious resume has slowly changed. Names, ID cards, addresses... have become weapons that can attack their holders, and maybe they don't need to be too obsessed with these external things. For people who meet by chance, there may be other ways to build trust. When I meet people, I still choose friendship and trust first, just like I did with "Officer Chen Wen". With the deepening of exchanges, if the intelligence and integrity of the other party cannot be matched, and there are too many clues, they have to be persuaded to quit.

I have known that successful private entrepreneur friend in the technology industry for nearly 20 years, and I have never addressed him by his legal name. Later, he changed his name, and I couldn't even call him by his first name. I don't know anything about his legal identity, but in my mind he has always been the network ID that has been used since the BBS days, and his current ether address.

Momo later sent me his legal name and address in DM, what is it? Do you want to achieve information symmetry with me? Your kindness is taken care of. In fact, now that I have figured it out, it's good to exist in the form of ID. The same people from the end of the world, why do they know each other when they meet. Change your name, change your address, change your ID card, change your passport... What can be changed or taken away is not "you", but "your"; "your" is the concept of the world, so there is possession and loss ; However, "you" is a concept of the divine world, and there will be no increase or decrease. He says.

One last word

In a few years, the blockchain technology will become more mature , and perhaps today's problems will not be a problem. (Are you stunned? Blockchain will be involved in anything you talk about recently...😂)