Feds charge Vietnamese suspect with slurp'n'flog of half-a-million Americans' ID data A Vietnamese man has been charged in connection with a long-running scam involving the theft and resale of what the DoJ rather hiply refers to as the "fullz”* (personal information) of hundreds of thousands of Americans. Hieu Minh Ngo, 24, a Vietnamese national, was hit with a total of 15 charges, including conspiracy to …
VietNam uses identity cards, recently updated to conform with ASEAN rules, using a number that is generated at birth.
In a persons late teens they are invited to visit the local identification centre where mugshots and fingerprints are taken. People are supposed to carry ID cards at all times. (They are also supposed to wear motorcycle helmets!)
It is a criminal offence for people/organisations to collect ID data unless legally authorised to and then only with a person's consent. This includes vehicle registration data and Land User Certificate numbers (no one actually owns land here, they long-term lease from governments)
There are also no "credit bureaus" per se - just banks who collect data and who 'share' information with other banks. Cash rules!
Vietnamese are recognised as sharp IT types - Japanese companies often hire the WHOLE class of IT graduates from certain VN universities.
Ironic that NGO, Hieu-Minh is making money from a society (USA) that eschews national identity cards.
Experian really should be under investigation if Krebs' allegations are true. On one hand they sold information on 500,000 people over the counter that allegedly was used to commit id fraud, meanwhile Experian are in the business of selling ID fraud detection and mitigation services to that same set of people on their books.
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