Identity Theft Victims' Claims

Tennessee Identity Theft Victims' Claims for Negligence

Identity theft is a broad term that covers a wide variety of problems that a person can encounter if someone else obtains unauthorized access to personal, financial, employment, or health care data. The damage that identity theft can cause ranges from unfavorable credit reports to bureaucratic nightmares concerning employment, insurance, or even a security clearance. If you are the victim of identity theft or identity fraud, contact an experienced lawyer at Hollins, Wagster, Weatherly & Raybin, P.C. in Nashville for a confidential discussion about your legal alternatives.

In most identity theft cases, the victim's rights against the actual thief are strong in theory, but as a practical matter your chance of recovering restitution from the guilty party is virtually nonexistent. A more promising avenue of recovery is to pursue your rights as a victim of identity theft against a third party whose failure to maintain your confidential data securely can be shown to have resulted in your losses.

Most people understand how to protect their personal and financial information in online transactions and in the storage and disposal of sensitive data. When your information is in the hands of a bank, an insurance company, or even an employer, however, the safety of your information is entirely dependent on the soundness of that third party's data maintenance and security systems.

Disclosures of security breaches--often long after the fact--have become increasingly common among banks, universities, government agencies, and insurance companies. Whether the confidentiality of your data was compromised as the result of an ineffective firewall or the theft of a key employee's laptop, the result to you is the same: your confidential personal data is in the hands of persons unauthorized to have it.

To establish a claim for negligent security against a financial institution or other entity, it is usually not enough to show that your confidential information was stolen from someone responsible for its safekeeping. You must also show that the data custodian's negligence resulted in actual and identifiable loss. Our attorneys will work with you and with forensic information technology experts to evaluate and investigate your claim for negligence leading to identity theft.

For additional information about your legal options in the aftermath of identity theft or identity fraud due to the carelessness of a third party, contact the trial attorneys at Hollins, Wagster, Weatherly & Raybin in Nashville.