The lesson here is, just don’t be low-hanging fruit. I doubt dumpster-divers trawl the suburbs anyway, not when there’s money to be made in upscale (or at least pricey) areas with apartment buildings. Getting caught digging through trash can lead to jail unless you got a good explanation, and how much easier to come up with one next to an apartment building as opposed to in some quiet ‘burb with separate homes? And shredding can be overkill when all you may need to do, for instance in the case of credit card offers, is just rip ‘em in half and throw one half away at the post office and leave the other in the back of your car ’til spring cleaning (that is, if you use a PObox like I do).

That said, shredders can still be fun.

What you need to shred is all those credit card applications you get in the mail. People can (and do) steal those from your trash, apply for a card under your name (but with a different address) and rack up tons of charges under your name. The first you’ll hear about it is when the collection agencies start calling. Or someone will get a bank loan under your name. Or buy a car. Those are the things that people spend years trying convice the lenders that it wasn’t them and to clear off their credit records. Those are the things that I think the lenders should have to prove that it was you who signed up for them with some physical evidence.

As an aside, I’m actually hesitant about throwing out old prescription bottles myself. It’s not that I think some street gang’s going to use them, I just don’t like the idea someone seeing in my trash what drugs I take. It’s like someone pawing through your medicine cabinet.

My Mom has a shredder – buried underneath piles of crap. If you think you’re paranoid, imagine someone who saves her old prescription bottles because she’s concerned some Mexican street gang can use them for nefarious purposes… assuring her that A: rural Broomfield has few recognized Mexican street gangs; B: there aren’t many illicit uses for thyroid hormone on the black market, and C: you can’t get a prescription refill from an empty bottle anyway, does not really penetrate. Think about that next time you worry about “paranoia”.

One interesting thing is that the charges appeared on a card that I use for exactly one recurring billing — no physical security breach was possible (so a shredder wouldn’t have helped).

The goverenment could clear up this identity theft problem pretty quickly by simply enacting a law that says that a person is not responsible for a dept unless the deptor (the credit card company or bank) can PROVE that the person entered into the dept, like with a thumbprint or photograph. I suspect that would stop the problem pretty much dead in its tracks.