The US House of Representatives is poised to consider a bill that would make it more difficult for consumers to protect their credit from identity thieves.

Backed by the lucrative financial-services industry, the Financial Data Protection Act of 2005 would narrow the circumstances in which consumers could restrict their credit activity to prevent fraudulent borrowing, and it would undermine stronger state-based reporting rules for companies that holdand sell consumer data.
More: http://www.freepress.net/news/16671

This is an especially worrying bill as it makes it MUCH more difficult for US consumers to protect their credit ratings, and to prevent criminals from taking out credit cards, mortgages, etc in the victim’s name. The fundemental problem is that credit card companies profit hugely from consumers easy access to credit, anything that restricts access to credit will cost the industry money. It’s cheaper in the long run to pass the cost of fraud on to merchants and consumers than it is to fix the problem.