Pierluigi Paganini
January 27, 2018
Crooks are offering for sale Social Security numbers of babies on the dark web, the news was reported by the CNN.
The news is disconcerting, this is the first time that unscrupulous sellers offer this kind of merchandise on a black marketplace.
The offer appeared on the Dream Market marketplace, one of the biggest Tor marketplace that has been around since around Nov/Dec 2013.
The seller is offering Social Security numbers of babies along with their dates of birth and mother’s maiden names, the ‘Infant fullz’ goes for $300 worth of bitcoin.
The slang term “Fullz” refers full packages of individuals’ identifying information. A “Fullz” package contains an individual’s name, Social Security number, birth date, account numbers and other data.
“Infant fullz get em befor tax seson [sic],” reads the ad.
‘Infant Fullz’ are a precious commodity in the criminal underground they allow crooks to access a clean credit history, they also allow crooks to apply for government benefits or take out mortgages.
The use of children PII is considered secure by cyber criminals because this specific type of identity theft could remain undiscovered for years.
“The listing for infant data was discovered by researchers at Terbium Labs, a dark web intelligence firm. The cost and age of the alleged victims came as a surprise to Emily Wilson, the company’s director of analysis.” states the CNN.
“Although the firm has seen child data for sale before, this was the first time it has seen infants’ data for sale.”
“It’s unusual to have information specifically marked as belonging to children or to infants on these markets,” Wilson said.
Identity theft crimes involving children is not a novelty, according to a 2011 report published by Carnegie Mellon University’s CyLab, the rate of this specific type of crimes for children as being 51 times greater than that of adults.
Researchers highlighted that “parents typically don’t monitor their children’s identities”.
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(Security Affairs – dark web, black marketplace)
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