But you can put it another way: if someone commit am identity fraud using a picture of your ID, you can defend yourself showing that you were required by many different entities to send a copy of your ID. So there are many parties that could have leaked your ID and a picture of you ID cannot be considered a prove that you authorized or allowed anything.
Case dismissed :)
If creditors want to get a judgement to garnish wages or seize assets they have to go to court. I wonder if the burden of proof is any different there, or if the parent's defence (everybody has a copy of my identification!) could work at that point?
Garnished wages are pretty rare from what I've heard, and yes it rarely gets to that point. It's still a nightmare for many people with real world consequences if it happens to you.
Over the years I've been trying to minimize my dependence on credit reports. It's been frozen for most of a couple decades, and I'd like to keep it that way. I've paid cash for vehicles, use secured credit cards, put down a deposit for my utility service, have a pay as you go phone, rent from people I know, and hope to remain self-employed, or work for people who know me enough to know that I can be trusted. I'd rather not deal with BigCorp. I realize that not everyone wants to or can do these things.
But that left me wondering about what would happen in a trial to get a judgement if someone was able to fraudulently open a line of credit in my name. I'm hoping that a judge would require more than a forged signature to seize my wages/assets. Personally this is what I worry about, not so much my credit report.
You need to file a police report and send a copy to the credit reporting companies with enough specifics to indicate which entries are not yours.