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FTC's Annual Consumer Complaint Report

Each year, the Federal Trade Commission releases a report on consumer complaints received during the previous year. The numbers for 2004 are out and identity theft leads the complaint topics. The FTC handled 635,173 fraud complaints in 2004. Almost two-fifths of these complaints (39%) involved identity theft. The most common form of identity theft was credit card fraud. Also listed were bank fraud, and phone fraud.

The category in second place (16%) was Internet auctions. Other categories, such as foreign money offers and lotteries could involve or result in identity theft and are related to banking practices. The report illustrates the importance of Internet security and consumer privacy. The Internet was a player in 53% of all fraud complaints.

Copyright © 2005 Compliance Action. Originally appeared in Compliance Action, Vol. 10, No. 2, 2/05

First published on 02/01/2005

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