Dishonest Educator Steals Thousands
This teacher stole thousands of dollars from a friend.
By Mitch Clarke, Marketing —
A sixth-grade teacher from Great Falls, Montana was charged with identity theft and forgery. After requesting a loan from a friend, she allegedly spent thousands of dollars while using her friend’s credit card. After adding her name to the account, Debra Thomas went on a shopping spree and never paid the money back. Her friend was left with thousands of dollars of debt.
Longtime Friend Gets Scammed
This case is interesting as it doesn’t follow the traditional model for fraud and identity theft. Thomas and her friend had known each other for years. Her friend stated that Thomas was never a dishonest type. As far as her friend was concerned, Thomas was an educator, and a safe person to extend a loan to. In order to prevent this kind of abuse in the future, IdentityDetect™ should be used by credit agencies to protect their cardholders information.
Protect Your Identity
Though Thomas’ friend provided her personal information, she did not authorize her to change information on the card itself. By using IdentityDetect™, the credit card company would have been notified that the one making the changes was not really the owner. IdentityDetect™ works by analyzing keystroke patterns and fluency. It makes an analysis of the data entry to determine whether or not the person entering the information is familiar with what they are typing. Technology like this could save millions from credit card fraud.
