In 2008 the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) received 313,982 complaints about identity theft, up from 258,427 complaints in 2007 and more than any other category in its Consumer Sentinel complaint database. But complaints do not present the full picture; a survey conducted for the FTC found that 3.7 percent of adults in the U.S., 8.3 million people, were victims in 2005. The most recent annual survey by Javelin Strategy & Research about identity fraud – the actual use of stolen information about individuals – showed that nearly 10 million adults were victims in 2008. The rise in identity theft and fraud is probably due to several factors, including increased sophistication of the thieves, more data being collected about people, significant security breaches, worsening economic conditions, and too many consumers still being unaware of the simple precautions that they can take to protect themselves.