Some students left the “You Are Toast!” lecture with more than the extra credit they had counted on.

The lecture, given by Steffen Schmidt, university professor in political science, brought the issue of identity theft to a new level of reality with his PowerPoint presentation that outlined both personal and national identity theft.

Schmidt began the lecture with several statistics that made identity theft seem more real to the average student. According to the Federal Trade Commission, identity theft is the fastest-growing white-collar crime in the U.S. There have been 27.3 million Americans who have been victims of identity theft in the past five years, and there have been 9.9 million in the last year alone. Although many credit card companies compensate for some stolen assets, they don’t come close to covering it all. According to a slide during the lecture, last year, consumer victims reported $5 billion in theft that they had to pay out of pocket.

Identity theft is not limited to individuals, according to slides shown by Schmidt. Last year, identity theft losses to businesses and financial institutions totaled nearly $48 billion.

A statistic Schmidt presented showed 68 percent of personal information theft was attributed to offline instances, such as credit cards. Only 11 percent was attributed to online instances, which would include information given in paying for something online or on social networking sites.

Schmidt also showed a KSWT News clip that warned children are becoming a favorite identity theft target because social security cards are not yet in a lockbox and are often on-hand. Axton Betz, graduate student in family and consumer sciences, education and studies, who attended the lecture, has been a victim of identity theft since she was 11.

“I’m still dealing with clearing up the mess,” Betz said, who didn’t realize she was a victim until she was 19 and started suffering the consequences of having bad credit.

Although she had never had a credit card, her credit report was 10 pages long.

She said dealing with the mess was very emotionally draining in every way.

“When you’ve been a victim for as long as I have, there is a loss of trust with the general world,” Betz said.

During the lecture, Schmidt also stated that entire countries are also prime targets for large-scale identity theft.

In order to make his point, he cited several international hacking instances that have been covered within the past week.

China, for instance, had allegedly launched cyber-war against the U.S. military in its effort to “level the playing field” by bringing down centralized information systems.

The lecture instilled a reverberating message that identity theft is more than something that just happens to a mutual friend or neighbor. With the dramatic increase in technology, information is spread with shocking haste and ease.

“We are no longer a private society,” Schmidt said.

That’s nice in a way, he said, but the fact that our generation has no concept of privacy is perfect for identity theft.

“Without privacy, there is no security,” he said.

Betz was adamant security should be a priority for those who want to avoid identity theft.

“Be vigilant and educate yourself,” she said, “It could happen to you.”