Apparently, it’s not that difficult to make $2-3 million through identity theft. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve undoubtedly received at least one email claiming to be from some wealthy Nigerian (or other foreign country) and offering you a sum of several millions of dollars if you’d only help them get the money out of the country. To do that, you must send them your bank information.

Not surprisingly, there are a lot of “opportunists” out there who give up their info in exchange for this possibility of wealth. These gullible saps soon become the victims of identity theft.

So, how does it work?

Police have just arrested two guys in Florida who allegedly run one of these identity theft scams. They’ve been trolling neighborhoods looking for vacant homes where they can send credit cards, bills and other mail without the home owner’s knowledge. Then, they apply for all sorts of credit cards, have them sent to these homes, and collect the mail.

The scary thing is that it sounds like police caught these two guys by accident. A patrol car just happened to be cruising the neighborhood and see a Pontiac drive up to a mailbox and grab the mail. They pulled the guys over, questioned them, and then searched their car - where they found all sorts of information in the names of other people.

Even more scary, one of the guys - Adentuji Idowu - has been investigated by the Secret Service since 1992 and has been arrested twice for committed identity fraud.

The moral? If an opportunity sounds “too good to be true”, it likely is. Save yourself a lot of time and hassle by not providing your personal information to anyone that offers you several million dollars. Learn how to protect yourself from identity theft.