There have been 1.2 million complaints of EIDL loan identity theft as of August 2021, according to a report from the Office of the Inspector General titl Top Management and Performance Challenges Fa telegram database users list cing the Small Business Administration in Fiscal Year 2022. That means over a million business owners believe their business identity has been us to apply for COVID relief loans administer by the Small Business Administration.
I’m one of those victims. Here’s what hap
I learn about the fraudulent application because my person crit report I monitor through Nav list an inquiry from “SBA ODA,” but I’ve never appli for a loan from the SBA.
I’ve written extensively about the Economic Injury Disaster Loan Program (EIDL) since it launch a nationwide loan and grant program to help businesses impact by the coronavirus back in March 2020. So when I spott the inquiry that mention SBA ODA, I knew that acronym stood for the SBA Office of Disaster Assistance, and I also knew that meant someone had likely appli for an EIDL using my identity.
This isn’t my first tangle with ID thieves. A few years ago someon rit card in my name and plac a large order for sneakers. Then in the spring of 2020, I discover crooks were again using my name to apply for crit and stimulus benefits.
An inquiry from a major crit card issuer popp up on my crit report. I hadn’t appli for crit recently, so I call the issuer. They explain there was a pending application for a crit card, but it had not yet been issu. I told them it was fraudulent.
Then an inquiry from a different financial institution appear on is time I learn the would-be crooks had open a bank account in my name. Weeks later I found out they successfully appli for unemployment using my information, even though I was employ full-time at Nav. Fortunately. The bank froze the check that was deposit from my state unemployment agency before they could c data on ash it. (A second bank account was open in my name but I was able to close it down quickly before any activity took place.)
I already had a fraud alert on my crit reports
Unlike the other times when I was able to call. The financial institutions i posting should be continuous n question, I wasn’t successful in finding a way to talk with someone from the Small Business. Administration to alert them or to find out what was going on. And since SBA EIDL loans don’t show up on personal or business crit reports. T have no way of knowing whether there is an. SBA loan outstanding with my name attach to it. (SBA EIDL loans for more than $25,000 result in a UCC-1 filing that would one on my crit reports.)