Title: CONCLUSION

Conclusion

This chapter shows that, from a policy standpoint, identity fraud is considered a big problem only from a document fraud point of view. This is actually the main argument advanced by the government to legitimise the introduction of an eID card with biometrics identifiers and based on centralised databases. However, it has appeared difficult to obtain accurate statistics on the prevalence of the phenomenon as no benchmarks have been developed so far.  

Another type of identity fraud, financial fraud, is considered a problem which is considered to be best combated by technical and organisational measures and by educating Internet users. Statistics reveal an increase in credit card fraud, which however does not seem to be perceived as a real threat by organisations such as the Forum of Rights on Internet or even by Internet users, as shown by a recent survey conducted by Unysis.

From a legal point of view, the previous government estimated that the legal framework provides sufficient protection against this kind of practice. Actually, identity fraud offences are hardly used in legal procedures when it comes to new forms of identity-related crime, such as phishing. Other crimes are better suited to prosecute offenders , such as fraud or unauthorised access to an information system. Cases where identity theft is not intended to result in fraudulent representation nor perpetrated through unauthorised access to an information system remain however unprotected. In that sense, Eric Braby and Vincent Dufief  highlighted that only one case does not fall under the legal provisions: when a person steals the digital identity of another without his/her knowledge. This could be the case when an individual creates false email addresses or digital identifiers without using them yet. The act would qualify as preparatory act and would not be criminally punishable. The victim would thus have no penal remedy against such conducts. Victims could, however, obtain remedies in civil courts on the basis of a judgement of 1965 giving protection to the sole use of the “name”. In this case it would however remain to be seen whether digital identifiers qualify as “names”.