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Date Posted: 21:39:16 01/22/04 Thu
Author: Dummy
Subject: Most consumer complaints last year involved online fraud

Most consumer complaints last year involved online fraud
By SIOBHAN McDONOUGH, Associated Press
Last Updated 3:46 p.m. PST Thursday, January 22, 2004
WASHINGTON (AP) - Reports of Internet-related fraud now account for more
than half the consumer complaints filed with the Federal Trade Commission,
the agency said Thursday.
Internet-related fraud was the subject of 55 percent of the more than
half-million complaints filed in 2003, up from 45 percent a year earlier,
the FTC said. The median loss for victims of Internet-related fraud was
$195.

Identity theft - stealing someone's personal information for financial
gain - was the most common complaint the FTC received for the fourth
consecutive year, the agency said. It represented 42 percent of all
complaints in 2003, up from 40 percent the year before.

The most common cases of identity theft involved credit cards, followed by
telephones or utilities, banks and workplace fraud.

But concern was growing about online transactions of any kind.

Internet auctions represented 15 percent of the complaints, while
shop-at-home/catalog sales were 9 percent, and Internet services and
computer complaints made up 6 percent.

The other top categories were prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries; foreign
money offers; advance fee loans and credit protection; telephone services;
business opportunities and work-at-home plans; magazine buyers clubs; and
office supplies and services.

Overall, 516,740 consumer complaints were filed last year, up from 404,000
in 2002.

The Washington area had the largest number of fraud complaints as a
percentage of the population, followed by the Seattle, San Diego, Phoenix
and the Tampa, Fla., areas.

The report highlighted data from Consumer Sentinel, the complaint database
developed and maintained by the FTC, and the Identity Theft Data
Clearinghouse.

The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center, the U.S. Postal Inspection
Service, the National Consumers League's National Fraud Information Center,
Canada's Phonebusters and Better Business Bureaus also contribute complaint
data to the FTC's database.

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