BSU confirms 80 ID theft victims

MUNCIE – Ball State University announced this week it has created an identity theft information line and learned that 80 of its employees are victims of tax return fraud.

Reports filed with city and county police show the victims include an associate vice president, a dean, assistant deans, assistant department chairs, directors and other senior officials in information technology, human resources, the controller’s office, the student center, the health center, the athletics department, the career center, the university foundation, the library, the human performance lab and counseling.

Numerous faculty also have filed police reports, but so far no clerical/maintenance/union/non-professional staff have done so other than a couple of office coordinators.

“They don’t have enough money,” said Delaware County police Lt. Greg Ellison.

Meanwhile, two local physicians, one employed at IU Health Ball Memorial Hospital, and a local senior home health specialist, Gary Brossart, also filed police reports recently of stolen Social Security numbers and fake tax returns being filed on their behalf.

“I would imagine all of this stuff goes back to Anthem,” the health care company that was the target of a cyber attack weeks ago, Brossart told The Star Press. Like BSU employees, Brossart is a member of Anthem.

While police know how many BSU victims have filed crime reports locally (around 80), they have less information on how much money has been stolen.

One BSU economics faculty member told police he received a tax refund in the mail of $8,395.10 on a pre-paid T-Mobile Visa card. When the professor and his wife called T-Mobile, they learned $8.10 remained on the card. The card was cashed in at Walmarts in several California cities.

When an associate dean received a refund in the mail of about $8,400 on a pre-paid Green Dot card, he found out only $3 was left on the card.

In some cases, the children of BSU employees also have had their Social Security numbers stolen, Ellison said. “They got the whole family,” he said of one case involving a couple and their three children.

An assistant dean who has not yet filed his tax return received a letter from the Treasury Department indicating he had received a refund of $8,739, of which $3,840 was intercepted and paid to a creditor, leaving a refund of $4,899. The assistant dean said he was not entitled to any refund.

Michele Chiuini, a professor of architecture, told police he received a fraudulent tax refund of $8,117, and that another architecture professor’s name mysteriously appeared on his tax return.

“ ... clearly whoever filed the tax return does not know me or my wife personally,” Chiuini told The Star Press. “Based on the spelling of my name, they must have believed I was a woman and added a male name as the spouse. It is also interesting that this other person is in my same department ...”

Professors of architecture, actuarial science, communications/journalism, athletic training, economics, physics, art, geography, voice, math, higher education, natural resources, counseling psychology, political science and history have filed police reports.

One of the faculty victims was Amy Harden, the chairperson of University Senate. When The Star Press asked her recently if she knew of any faculty victims, she responded, “I have not talked to anyone who has been victimized ... but today found out that I am one of those people.”

There are likely more than 80 victims, according to Scott Sherwood, an officer in the records division at the Muncie Police Department. He cited a state law requiring the law enforcement agency where identity theft victims reside to take a crime report.

Many BSU faculty and professional staff live outside of Delaware County, including a large number in the Fishers/Carmel/Noblesville/Zionsville/Indianapolis zip codes.

Anthem and Ball State officials, along with cyber security experts at Indiana and Purdue universities, have told The Star Press there is no evidence that the Anthem security breach is related to fraud schemes at Ball State or anywhere else.

The university’s news center this week quoted stolen identity victim Dan Byrnes, director of BSU sports facilities, as saying: “As one agent of the credit bureaus stated, your Social Security number is out there forever, so the journey of protecting our family’s identity looks like it will be a lifelong pursuit. That’s scary. It is frustrating to have one incident that is not your fault cause so much stress and inconvenience, particularly when you think you have done all the right things in protecting your identity and financial health.”

Ball State on Monday launched an identity theft information line for employees at 765-285-4883 and at IDtheft@bsu.edu. In addition, the university has created a web page at bsu.edu/idtheft.

The news center quoted Frank Groom, a BSU information/communication sciences professor, as saying: “This has been going on for years, but in isolated clusters, so the news stays local. For example, there is not much national news about the Ball State and Western Kentucky tax fraud. However, Hagens, Berman, Sobol, and Shapiro LLP of Seattle have filed a class action lawsuit against Anthem for the lack of security of customer identity information. There must be some activity there in Seattle. Furthermore, Bloomberg Business and the Insurance Journal have stated that the FBI has tentatively identified Chinese state-sponsored hackers as the Anthem thieves.”

Ball State’s confirmation of at least 80 victims comes from employees “who chose to tell us they were victimized,” spokeswoman Joan Todd said. “ ... we don’t know who might have been victimized and hasn’t reported it. And some might not even know at this point, since the filing deadline is more than a month away.”

Contact Seth Slabaugh at (765) 213-5834.