Personal Identity Theft - Dissertation Example

In defining this terminology, Blair (2011) identifies three steps undertaken by such criminals: trying to obtain another person’s information, trying to misuse the obtained information and finally, executing the crime with the intention of victimising the target. Recovery from this crime could be frustrating, expensive and time consuming for the victim. The objective of paper is to come up with a sensitization framework of educating the public on identity theft and to establish ways of preventing the crime.

To achieve this, this paper will give a background of the crime, articulating the forms in which it could be executed. Determining the prevalence of the crime would be important in forming the basis of discussion on prevention measures and the public awareness. Guided by the findings from the secondary sources, the review will finally recommend effective public education strategies. The paper is divided into two sections. The first section focuses on the previously published papers that have discussed the identity theft background and history.

Various forms of identity theft including physical forms and technology-based forms will be discussed in this section. In the second section, the paper seeks to develop a sensitization program that would appropriate in enabling the society to deal with the cyber crimes in the most effective way. PART 1: LITERATURE REVIEW Early approaches to identity theft Despite the newness of the name identity theft, the phenomenon is old with the early forms adopting the simple forms of impersonation. Impersonation refers to the imitation of another person so as to defraud others, usually for personal gains (Hoffman & McGinley 2010).

The early imposters imitated. Despite the newness of the name identity theft, the phenomenon is old with the early forms adopting the simple forms of impersonation. Impersonation refers to the imitation of another person so as to defraud others, usually for personal gains (Hoffman & McGinley 2010). The early imposters imitated the talking, dressing and behaviour of others, which with time became ineffective as other more effective personal identification theft forms emerged. Stolen, fictitious and forged identification documents together with financial account information catalysed identity theft.

Today, technology has transformed the usage, collection and storage of personal information making identity theft a more complex crime. Hoffman and McGinley (2010) cite the Biblical story of Jacob who masqueraded as Esau so as to receive his father’s blessings as among the early forms of identity theft. This was propagated by Rebecca, the mother, who was determined to ensure that her son Jacob and not Esau receives her husband’s blessings. With the father’s poor visibility due to old age, Esau’s dressing was used to disguise his smell and application of goatskin to fool the touch of the hairy Esau.

In the Middle Ages, the 1450 Cade’s rebellion gives a story of John Aylmer who changed his name several times, organised a rebel army, all in an attempt to overthrow the England King Henry VI (Hoffman & McGinley 2010). Despite his failure, John has been widely considered as an opportunist motivated by the desire for personal glorification.