State Senate passes identity theft bill
State Senate passes identity theft bill
ALBANY – The New York State Senate Thursday passed legislation sponsored by Senator Stephen Saland (R-C-I, Poughkeepsie), that would toughen the state’s law against the crime of identity theft by expanding the types and amount of personal identification that would be needed to charge someone with identity theft, as well as increasing criminal penalties for the crime.
Under current law, a person has to unlawfully possess at least 250 pieces of personal identification to be charged with identity theft. This bill decreases that number to a much more reasonable ten pieces. In addition, the bill expands the list of personal identification information to include such things as an individual’s driver’s license number, social security number, Internet account number and taxpayer ID numbers.
This legislation strengthens existing penalties for identity theft in the second degree to a class D felony, from a class E and identity theft in the first degree to a class C felony penalized by as much as 15 years in prison.
The bill was sent to the Assembly.