The police were summoned. The customer told the investigating officer that the ID was hers, but the credit card was her mother’s, which she had permission to use. The photo ID looked like her, but the officer wasn’t completely certain. Lacking any evidence to the contrary, however, no further action was taken….until the officer got back to a computer. There, the officer was able to do a bit of ad hoc research. She found the social media profile of the name on the credit card. Sure enough, it was unmistakably the customer, who had apparently “borrowed” an ID from someone that looked similar enough to her that it wasn’t obvious at the scene.
Michael Sauers is the Director of Logan Library in Logan, UT. Prior to this he was one of the founding staff and Technology Manager for Do Space in Omaha, NE. After earning his MLS in 1995 from the University at Albany's School of Information Science and Policy Michael spent his first 20 years as a librarian training other librarians in technology along with time as a public library trustee, a bookstore manager for a library friends group, a reference librarian, a technology consultant, and a bookseller. He has written dozens of articles for various journals and magazines and has published 14 books ranging from library technology, blogging, Web design, and an index to a popular horror magazine. In his spare time, he blogs at TravelinLibrarian.info, runs The Collector's Guide to Dean Koontz website at CollectingKoontz.com, takes many, many photos, and typically reads more than 100 books a year.
Unless otherwise stated, all opinions are my own and are not to be considered those of the City of Logan, UT.
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The police were summoned. The customer told the investigating officer that the ID was hers, but the credit card was her mother’s, which she had permission to use. The photo ID looked like her, but the officer wasn’t completely certain. Lacking any evidence to the contrary, however, no further action was taken….until the officer got back to a computer. There, the officer was able to do a bit of ad hoc research. She found the social media profile of the name on the credit card. Sure enough, it was unmistakably the customer, who had apparently “borrowed” an ID from someone that looked similar enough to her that it wasn’t obvious at the scene.
