Let me preface this by saying I'm not a lawyer nor do I have any legal training and laws regarding ID theft and consumer credit reporting vary by state. That said,
Going through this right now myself. Best general advice is contact all 3 major reporting agencies. Experian, Trans Union, and Equifax and put up a fraud alert if you haven't done this yet. If you contact one its supposed to contact the other 2 but alert all 3 just to be safe. It lasts 90 days and creditors must call a phone number you provide to verify you are trying to open the acct. I don't remember if this stops inquiries as well. You can then get a 7 year fraud alert if you file a police report. Get all her credit/debit/ bank acct. numbers changed. Any place shes provided personal information to is a place it could have been stolen from. Purchase a car, buy a home, open a bank account, open or apply for a credit card, even applying for an apartment if they do a credit check. Hell, I know someone who stole credit applications from the garbage by the registers at the local Lowe's. Oh, and I can't forget the military. Half of my high school graduating class had their info stolen from the military records for the ASVAB and some was used. I believe mine was stolen from Lackland AFB as the lease was sold in my name Austin after I was back in WA. /rant off
Start doing serious investigation on this now. Get a notebook or legal pad and keep detailed logs of every conversation you have regarding this issue and write the entries as soon as you are done talking with the person. Put things such as who you talked to, what company or agency they are from, a detailed summary of the conversation, time, date, their name, phone number, etc. The FTC website (
Federal Trade Commission Home) has good info on id theft, get on there and check it out. If I seem scatterbrained I apologize. I'm just still fired up over my case and was at the lawyers today.