Recession hits spammers and ID thievesEuropeans worth twice as much as Americans, shockerBy Sylvie Barak: Thursday, 10 April 2008, 5:00 PMTHESE ARE HARD economic times for all, including, it would appear, for identity thieves. So plentiful are the data leaks nowadays, with governments losing data left, right and centre and companies carelessly passing around people’s credit card numbers and other personal information, that it's bringing the prices of identity theft to new all time lows, hitting the fraudsters where it hurts.Cyber crims are even having to resort to legitimate business strategies, like offering volume discounts, in order to keep revenues at an acceptable level, according to a Symantec Internet security report. The latest twice-yearly report, released this week, says that access to bank accounts was now going for as little as $10 in the second half of 2007, and that thieves were increasingly selling stolen credit card numbers in batches of 500 for a total of $200, or 40 cents each [More than mine's worth - Ed]. This is less than half of what they were going for in the first half of 2007.Buying a person’s whole identity, which includes a credit card number, Social Security number or ID and a person's name, address and date of birth, would only now set you back $100 for 50, so $2 per stolen identity.Apparently though, some identities are worth more than others. Europeans will be happy (?) to know that their identities are much more coveted and, therefore more expensive (by about 50 per cent) than those of Americans, for instance. Some Euro identities even sell for as much as $30 a piece.As much as we would like to claim that the reason for this is the fact that us Europeans are just worth oodles more for our class, brilliance and wit, it is more likely that the real reason lies in the fact that European identities are easier to use in multiple countries.As ironic as it is that the volatile economy is squeezing the crooks dry, too, the report also highlights another interesting fact; there is indeed honour amongst thieves.The report notes that if any crook passes on fraudulent information, they can expect harsh consequences from other hackers. Alfred Huger, vice president of Symantec Security Response told Fox News:"If the seller says there's $10,000 in a bank account, and there isn't $10,000 in there, their ability to sell will drop through the floor."As, no doubt, will a number of their limbs and internal organs.
