Fed Chief falls victim to Identity Theft

The serious crime of identity theft has been affecting millions of Americans, but who could have thought that the Federal Reserve chief himself will be one of the victims. Yes you read it right, Ben Bernanke, the Federal Chairman, has fallen victim to an identity fraud ring.

According to the news and reports, the Federal Chairman became entangled in this identity theft scheme after his wife Anna's purse was stolen from a coffee shop on Capitol Hill Starbucks last August. There were four credit cards, personal checks, Social Security card and IDs in her purse. Though it was not revealed how much money was stolen, but somebody had started cashing checks on their bank account. Immediately Mr.Bernanke had reported them to the bank, filed a police report and alerted the credit card companies when the purse was stolen.

Later it was found that although the thief did not target Anna specifically, he was a part of a crime ring for which many investigations were going on for months. In a way this theft helped fuel an ongoing investigation. If we go by the statistics given by Newsweek magazine as on Wednesday, the identity theft ring had stolen over $2.1 million from financial institutions and individuals.

Cylde Austin Gray is one of the ringleaders, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud in federal court in Alexandria,last month. The court record showed that he was involved in employing an army of thieves, pick pockets and office workers to swipe cards, checks and other personal records.

Mr.Ben Bernanke, in a statement to Newsweek, showed his gratefulness to the law enforcement officers who worked patiently and diligently to solve such financial crimes.

No one is safe from identity theft. So if any of your personal information is stolen, be it credit cards, checkbook, IDs or any such thing, immediately alert all your financial institutions and act wisely to protect yourself.