A lot of identity theft occurs when people just make up an SSN and use it to gain employment or credit. If they are lucky, the credit file doesn't exist yet an

A lot of identity theft occurs when people just make up an SSN and use it to gain employment or credit. If they are lucky, the credit file doesn't exist yet and no one is the wiser. The "theft" part occurs when someone is assigned that SSN starts using it and finds out that they have $300,000 in bad loans on their credit file. This is usually a kid who is applying for student loans or their first car loan. Then they must spend time/money cleaning up their credit file. http://news.debix.com/index.php/2008/11/teenager-tarnished-by-600000-house-foreclosure/ http://news.debix.com/index.php/2008/11/teenager-tarnished-b... Discolsure: I'm a former employee and current investor in Debix.