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Comment by jph | Hacker News Reader

Fidelity is the one to focus on immediately because it's the most serious-- by far-- and they have walk-in locations where a real account rep can help you. The downtown SF location near Market & 2nd has excellent staff in my experience.

Fidelity might turn up something about identity theft, or credit reports, or red flags, or similar. If so, you can handle these. If not, then ask a private investigator for help; a good PI has research tools to find problems then help you fix them.

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Agree with the other comments here and would like to add that the OP may have the same name as a person on one of those government lists like OFAC and are getting identity confused with a "known terrorist". US Gov requires certain companies to check the list before doing business with people.

I can confirm I had issues flying for about the first four years post 9-11. The first flight I took, there was kind of a panic and security showed up. Every time I flew, there was always some kind of issue and a call for assist, though each time it got less and less of a panic. One time the desk attendant lamented, “more and more of these every day”. I asked why this keeps happening. He said my name or ssn was close enough to someone on the govt watch list that I was effectively on the list.

We need to remember this every time some politician says "if you're on the terrorist watch list, you shouldn't be able to..."

Or just better fund actual security.

These scenarios always result from watering down actual security.

I had the same issue post 9/11 for a few years. I was unable to check-in to flights or receive boarding passes. I had to get a "gate pass" from a baggage agent to go through security and then check-in with the gate agent to be assigned a boarding ticket. This also applied on every connection and they required identification and occasionally additional questions each time.

Exact same for me for about four or five years post. I eventually came across my (extremely normal) name in an article about common names that were on the watch list and causing issues for many Americans. Even members of Congress were caught by it. Unfortunately, that article came out a few years of no airline agent being able to tell be why I couldn’t check in for my flight. They were cagey every time I asked.

One of the gate agents told me I must share a name with someone on a terrorist watch list early on. I have a common name as well so I figured that was it. Most gate agents thought nothing of it but being unable to get a seat assignment until near boarding meant I was stuck in the middle a lot. Several were awesome and took pity by upgrading me, but a few power tripping ones treated it like an interrogation. I can easily see how much worse it was for those with Middle Eastern names or appearance.

I'm pretty sure I run into this any time I fly internationally. Our group always gets held up, a manager gets called, and we're approved.

One time the manager pointed at me and said with a smile, "You're trouble."

There was a (presumed dead) Canadian terrorist with my name.

> ssn was close enough to someone on the govt watch list that I was effectively on the list

This is exceedingly dumb if true. Numerical adjacency of SSNs is completely meaningless.

Yes, but if I was looking to make a fake identity, I would steal a real one and fudge something like the SSN plus or minus one on a random digit. Then you can blame the mismatch on their people making a typo, and they would be less likely to look closer at my forged SSN card/Passport/Drivers License.

Okay but the issue here is SSNs close to one that's already flagged also get flagged apparently. If you know your social is flagged and are giving a fake one why would you make it anything remotely similar to your own already flagged one?

It’s what I remember the desk agent telling me. Who knows how much that person knew about the system (and even if my memory is 100% accurate).

I had issues travelling a few years ago, nothing serious just lots of back-to-back secondary screening. I contacted DHS and was notified weeks later my case had been reviewed. They never explained what happened but the screenings stopped.

I guess Elon Musk had the right idea giving his kid a non-alphabetic name.. less chances of this stupidity to affect them.

(The above is a joke, I'm guessing US government systems can't handle non-ASCII characters, and a German named Müller would have to be Mueller or Muller)

It's definitely not a terrible idea to have a unique(ish) name. Your name is somewhat like your username for non digital things, or at least part of your username.

I don't have a particularly common name but when I google it I share it with an English football player and someone from South Africa who has been convicted of real estate fraud.

I've never been to South Africa but I have worked for a real estate portal, and it's on my LinkedIn (which I barely use, but still). I can see how someone outside would not be able to separate the two.

Or the opposite, I imagine a name like "John Smith" couldn't have this issue because there would be so many matches.

https://sanctionssearch.ofac.treas.gov/

Go to this tool and check to see if your name is coming up with any returns.

Ouch. I can't think of any other plausible explanation. If so, is that a problem that can actually be fixed except by changing your name? They're not going to strike the name from the list (and all its copies) just because it's a nuisance to someone.

It kinda makes one wonder if anyone getting into a bit of terrorism for a hobby wouldn't do well to change their name to that of someone in the US congress first: no way that name would stay on a blacklist for long.

> If so, is that a problem that can actually be fixed except by changing your name?

It wouldn't shock me if even changing your name didn't do it, the name change records are surely data available to the algorithms.

Agreed, this is the most important. And go ahead and bring key documents - driver license, passport, lease/rental agreements, last year's taxes, a previous statement you have from them, whatever.

Anything that will help you prove: a) you are who you say you are and b) this is your account will be useful.

And if you're physically in their office, they can and will follow the backchannels to get a better result faster than you can over the phone.

Agree that Fidelity is the most serious but they cannot help OP anymore. OP's situation sounds like his/her SSN and CC is circulating on the dark web forums.

OP, you should buy an Equifax or Experian credit package immediately, review every account, and put a freeze on your credit report. This will be the best twenty bucks spent in your situation.

Instagram and Google would not even have their SSN or credit card number (if OP is being honest about how little they used those accounts), so I don't see how you can conclude that one of those is the factor...

the google one is normal if you haven't logged in in years, especially if you're in a different place now. Google is perfectly happy to lock people out of their accounts with the correct password

Instagram, Google and Twitter probably have a different cause. Everyone gets accounts disabled on these services, if one doesn't use them often.

It can feel like you're being attacked with a list like this, but it's highly likely the tech items are just coincidence.

Shouldn’t requesting the free credit report from each bureau be the first step before going to the paid one?

Absolutely - don't use the paid one ever, that's basically submitting to their protection racket. It's a problem they created in the first place.

You can check your credit for free, and the freezes are also free.

Don’t expect too much from the personal approach. I had a similar problem with Bank of America where they wouldn’t open a business account for me because the risk management department vetoed it. Visiting the local branch didn’t help: the local staff was friendly and tried to assist, but were equally stonewalled by the home office.

They refused to give me any clue how to address their concerns, so I just moved my accounts — all of them — to another bank. But that was mostly out of spite, not because I believe the new bank doesn’t have equally troublesome possibilities.

BTW, I have got to be about the least risky imaginable person to open an account for.

It's really insane if you need to hire a PI to find out what you did wrong.

To find out what people think you did wrong

Privatized justice is great, isn't it?

I would go after the most important accounts on the real government based Justice system (and forget about any non-important one). But I'm not from the US and I don't know how binding are those agreements that you won't seek the Judiciary. (Anyway, arbitrage should be fair enough to let your point through, but I don't know how accessible it is.)

What kinds of non-public research tools do PIs have access to?

Also set up 2fa on your fidelity account. Don’t use SMS, use their app.

I don't know about Fidelity specifically, but it seems like these days, most of the staff at the in-person bank offices don't do anything but guide you through the same web forms you could fill out yourself.

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