ID Theft 2005 Year in Review

CNet's roundup of articles related to identity theft and data security.

Personal Credit Index - Optimistic Financial Outlook for 2006

Experian's Personal Credit Index shows results of a survey by Gallup/Experian. The outlook for 2006 appears pretty optimistic for most respondents. One of the brightest aspects of the survey show 38% of those surveyed plan to pay off all their personal debt within the next year. I assume that doesn't include their home mortgage loans, but even so, I wonder if people aren't just a little over optimistic. I know I always figure I'll make more money and pay off my debt a lot sooner than actually happens. In addition to that stat, 36% of those surveyed plan to improve their credit score in 2006. Only 2% expect their credit score to be worse in the coming year. It makes me wonder what these people plan on doing this year that will hurt their credit score. The percentage is so low, it's possible that the 2% are simply the ever-pessimistic ones that always figure things will turn for the worse. I love seeing data from surveys like this, but I can't help but think the methods are flawed if we're asking consumers because we're always going to understate the amount of debt we have and over estimate how quickly we can pay it off. I would be very interested in seeing a follow up study next year to see how many of these people acutally accomplished what they set out to do--especially if it were backed up by some concrete evidence beyond each person's own responses.