Identity theft possibilities

Identity theft possibilities

Author
Discussion

BliarOut

Original Poster:

72,857 posts

240 months

Wednesday 12th October 2005
quotequote all
I applied for a loan recently. All went well, and yesterday I got the paperwork back, along with someone elses pay slips :yikes:

So now I have a full name, an address, a national insurance number and a domestic phone number. I also have full salary details. Being a genealogist, I can get a photocopy birth certificate in a day or two. If I was to do a little research, I would have everything I need to start applying for loans etc with very little extra work.

Why have I mentioned all this? Fortunately, I'm of a generally honest persuasion. I did some research so I could ring the person who's details I got so they could take it up with the company in question.

The person was surprised, and pleased that I rang, but I'm interested, did the company commit an offence and if so, what?

If the details (Or my details!) had been sent to the wrong person, it could have been bad news indeed.

iTT

9 posts

252 months

Wednesday 12th October 2005
quotequote all
Sounds like a big Data Protection Act breach to me.......

havoc

30,090 posts

236 months

Wednesday 12th October 2005
quotequote all
iTT said:
Sounds like a big Data Protection Act breach to me.......

HUGE!!!

Not sure there's anything you can do, but the poor chap who's been wronged...should be seeing the CAB &/or a solicitor right now!

BliarOut

Original Poster:

72,857 posts

240 months

Thursday 13th October 2005
quotequote all
I've sent it all back to the person concerned. Hopefully it will be thoroughly persued to prevent a recurrence

mcflurry

9,099 posts

254 months

Thursday 13th October 2005
quotequote all
About 10 years ago a mate and I bought some 2nd hand pcs from an office job lot.

The Life Assurance company software and database was still stored on the (unformatted) local drives