You're missing the point. Obviously yes your credit score gets hurt, and yes you sometimes have the hassle of recovering money, re-establishing your identity,

You're missing the point. Obviously yes your credit score gets hurt, and yes you sometimes have the hassle of recovering money, re-establishing your identity, etc. The entire point of the article is that all these harms are not something the identity thief does to you. They are things that the identity thief does to SOME CORPORATION, and then that corporation passes part of the problem on to you. And the phrase "identity theft" is part of the way of thinking that allows the corporations to justify passing the harm on to you. The short audio clip from Mitchell And Webb that people in here are passing around really explains it best. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CS9ptA3Ya9E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CS9ptA3Ya9E