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Comment by NortySpock | Hacker News Reader

I just go all the way to "bank fraud" to make it obvious who should be doing more due diligence.

This is the correct terminology. If someone opens an account with a bank using false credentials that’s just fraud. And the victim here is the bank, not the individual.

If undetected by the bank, the individual becomes the victim when their financial reputation is sullied by false reports of failure to repay debts.

Send like a clear cut case of bank libel to me:

> Libel is a method of defamation expressed by print, writing ... that is injurious to a person's reputation, ... or injures a person in his/her business or profession.

Might even be able to get punitive damages.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/libel

Note, the person who "had their identity stolen" (that phrasing is an absurdity, twisted language designed to obscure and defraud the truth) was never a party to the deal. The only parties relevant here are the bank and the person that defrauded the bank. The only victim is the bank. Nobody here is arguing that this problem doesn't exist for real people, we're saying that it's insane that it even exists at all.

Unfortunately, there's a law [1] that protects creditors and credit bureaus from that unless they act out of malice.

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1681h (e)

That's interesting.

> (e) Limitation of liability

> ... no consumer may bring any action or proceeding in the nature of defamation, ... or negligence with respect to the reporting of information against any ... person who furnishes information to a consumer reporting agency ... except as to false information furnished with malice or willful intent to injure such consumer.

Isn't posting bad information a "willful intent to injure"? I can't imagine the banks are piblishing bad info in order to help the consumer.

No. It’s a term of art, and no court will interpret it the way you suggest.

In order for it to be a willful intent to injure, they have to believe it's not you and report that is is in order to knowingly tarnish your reputation. Generally if they publish bad data about you it's because the data they have is bad. It's not because out of all the accounts at JP Morgan Chase or Wells Fargo or wherever some faceless drone decided your faceless account needs to be specifically and maliciously lied about.

Until the bank libels the individual to the credit reporting agencies. Then the individual is a victim.

I prefer bank libel, because the bank is publishing false negative information about someone.

Opening an account or the existence of one isn't "negative information."

Opening an account or the existence of one isn't "negative information."

Sure, but I meant if they're reporting you to a credit agency for owing money or whatever. That is them publishing false information about you that will have negative consequences for you.

It's false information though, if the person hasn't opened an account. It might or might not be negative based on what the recipient of that information deduces, but it's definitely false.

The problem would be intent: my understanding is that in the U.S. at least you would have to show that they knew it was false when they published it or refused to correct it. If they simply say “technical error, we fixed it” I think your odds of reaching that bar would be quite daunting.

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