Feds Indict 11 in Biggest Ever Identity Theft Case

As a follow up to our original 2007 story on the Identity "Theft to the Maxx" large scale data breach effecting 40 million consumers, a federal court this past week charged a fraud gang responsible for data breaches involving nine major retailers. 11 people, including even a confidential informant working for the Secret Service, were charged in connection with a case involving illegally tapping into the wireless payment processing systems of the following retail outlets: TJX (TJ Max) OfficeMax Boston Market Barnes & Noble Sport's Authority DSW Forever 21 BJ's Wholesale Club Besides tapping into the wireless networks of these major retailers, the thieves were successful in setting up programs that captured card numbers , passwords and account information from a massive amount of unsuspecting consumers. While TJX admitted to 45 million consumers were negatively impacted from the two year period the identity thieves had unauthorized access to their payment processing data, court documents revealed the real estimate was closer to 100 million consumers confidential data was compromised based on depositions by Visa and Mastercard. The ring leader, a Miami man who was also the confidential informant for the Secret Service, turned out to be a double agent who had been providing criminals information about ongoing investigations and tipping off associates. With the massive amount of credit account access information stolen and provided to worldwide identity thieves, this case involving TJX has a big impact in our personal identity and financial safety. So, our tip for today is contact your Visa or Mastercard issuer and request a replacement account number as well as the capability to have "alias" number issuance for when you conduct business online. Additionally, make sure you select a credit monitoring service to alert you to any unauthorized transactions and/or over a certain threshold amount to keep the chances of identity theft credit fraud from damaging your financial future. Finally, be a good friend and share this tip with them so they too can fight back against identity theft . This article may be published in it's entirety on your site. Article courtesy of

You can listen to Feds Indict 11 in Biggest Ever Identity Theft Case online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Feds Indict 11 in Biggest Ever Identity Theft Case is an episode from Identity Theft Secrets.

The episode duration depends on the source podcast feed and may not always be available.

This episode was published on Aug 9, 2008.

Yes. Use the heart button on the episode page to add it to your favorite episodes list.

Yes. This page shows related episodes from Identity Theft Secrets when more episodes are available from the podcast feed.