IDENTITY THEFT Is it a problem What is being done

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IDENTITY THEFTIs it a problem? What is being
done?

• Energy Association of Pennsylvania
• Consumer Services Track
• June 2, 2005

Presented by Pete Klipa - Director, Revenue
Recovery, NiSource Brian Flynn Director,
Decision Power and Authentication Services,
Equifax
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PRESENTATION OVERVIEW

• About NiSource
• Definition
• Methods
• Statistics
• NiSource Experience

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ABOUT NISOURCE

• Fortune 500 holding company headquartered in
  Merrillville, Indiana.
• 15 subsidiary companies engage in natural gas
  transmission, storage distribution as well as
  electric generation, transmission distribution.
• Deliver energy to more than 3.7 million customers
  in high energy corridor stretching from the Gulf
  Coast through the Midwest to New England.
• Over 16,000 miles of interstate transmission
  pipeline 55,000 miles of distribution pipeline.
• Over 9,000 employees.
• Income from continuing operations of 430 million
  in 2004.

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ABOUT NISOURCE

• Northern Indiana Public Service Northern Indiana
  Fuel Light
• Kokomo Gas
• Customers
• Electric - 443,000
• Gas 776,000

• Bay State Gas/Northern Utilities
• Customers
• Mass. 279,000
• N.H. 26,000
• Maine 24,000

• Columbia Gas
• Customers
• Ohio 1,400,000
• Pennsylvania 401,000
• Virginia 209,000
• Kentucky 141,000
• Maryland 32,000

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DEFINITION
Identity theft occurs when a thief takes over a
consumer's entire identity by stealing critical
private information, such as the Social Security
number, driver's license number, address, credit
card number or bank account number. It is a high
profit, low risk, low penalty crime, thats
growing.
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NATIONAL STATISTICS

• Identity theft is America's fastest growing
  crime
• 10 million victims 50 billion in losses to
  business, 9 billion to consumers
• Identity theft costs an average of over 10,000
  in money, goods, and services per incident.
• The most common ID theft complaint related to
  credit card fraud, followed by phone or utility
  fraud.
• President Bush recently signed a law establishing
  "aggravated identity theft" as a crime with a
  minimum sentence of two years without probation.
• 97 of all fraudulent applications contain a
  valid SSN.
• The majority of fraudulent accounts have no links
  to known fraud at the time of application

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NATIONAL STATISTICS (Theft Subtype of Total
Identity Theft)
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PENNSYLVANIA STATISTICS (2004 complaints reported
by Pennsylvania victims)
2004 complaints were up 15. s are larger than
100 due to multiple losses for the same victim
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COLUMBIA GAS of PA STATISTICS
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NISOURCE EXPERIENCE

• During theft of service study, leaders across
  NiSource repeatedly asked if identity theft was
  part of study.
• Field employees restore service for non-pay
  customers and wonder how the household managed to
  avoid payment of a final bill.
• Call Center employees frequently have suspicions
  about a new customer application, but are
  powerless to make a non-discriminatory decision
  if a quality name and Social Security number are
  provided.
• Current tools (Pos ID and Credit Scoring), match
  name and Social Security number, which is a
  necessary process step, but do little to protect
  NiSource from customers who are not who they say
  they are. NiSource also has a fax team in the
  Call Center that handles photo IDs.
• To combat identity theft, a program from Equifax,
  called eIDverifer, is being tested at Columbia
  Gas of Kentucky.