Identity thieves advertising on YouTube

In one video the seller, who never reveals his face, offers full identity dossiers for US$25 a time, or five for US$100. The dossiers contain the subject’s names, address, social security number, driving license details, sex, mother's name, occupation, age, car license plate, date of birth and net worth including any real estate and liquid assets.

“It's crazy,” said Brian Sullivan, MSNBC’s online crime correspondent.

“I talked to this guy via email and he said he would sell me the details in exchange for a PayPal deposit. His ad even had a disclaimer that the information could only be used for marketing purposes and can’t be used for illegal activity.”

He blamed companies for storing too much information on customers for the growing commercialisation of identity theft, calling them “packrats.”

Too often he said they collected information that had no relevance and stored it for good, making customers more vulnerable.

YouTube has a strict take-down policy on videos advertising illegal services and any such sites should be reported immediately.