| I.D. Theft & Guns |
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| Written by Matt Cush | |
| Wednesday, 19 April 2006 | |
You walk into your local gun shop, money in hand, pick out that new piece of hardware you have been drooling over, the clerk runs your name through NCIC, as he always does, and you're denied. Your name, your social security number, and date of birth were used to purchase a firearm which some scumbag used in the commission of a crime, maybe rape or murder. Guess what? You're now a suspect. "Bob Citizen now faces criminal charges as well as a loss of good reputation."John Snyder, a gun law expert, goes on in the article to say that "this is the kind of tragedy with which any law-abiding American gun owner could be confronted." "We must insure that no criminal steals the good name of a law-abiding gun owner in order to purchase a firearm through NCIC. We need to support legislative proposals designed to prevent I.D. thefts from achieving their objectives. Gun owners can support legislation to clamp down on I.D. theft, to severely punish perpetrators convicted of I.D. theft or to make I.D. theft more difficult." The current measure "most worthy of support", per Snyder, is "(DATA) Data Accountability and Trust Act, (HR 4127) authored by Congressman Cliff Stearns of Florida." "This measure would instruct the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to promulgate regulations that require each person engaged in interstate commerce that owns or possesses data in electronic form containing personal information to establish and implement policies and procedures regarding information security practices for the treatment and protection of personal information. "It would provide nationwide notice in the event of a security breach." This kind of activity is bad enough, but now it's our guns and our felony free records that each of us stands to lose. I imagine that with enough time and a pile of money we could each beat this type of criminal charge, but going through that could literally take years and all the while we are unable to defend ourselves and our families, being considered a criminal for all intents and purposes. These liberties did not come cheap, in their own respect; we need to put our lawmakers behind this legislation as a pre-emptive strike against society's worst. Complete Story I.D. theft and information on preventing it visit: http://www.consumer.gov/idtheft |