or it's sometimes called false impersonation.

And basically this is a situation

where you assume somebody else's identity for the purpose

of either A-- harming that person,

or B-- gaining some benefit for yourself.

Now keep in mind it has to be a real person.

So for example, if cops pull me over and I tell them I'm James

Bond 007, that's not false personation because that's not

a real person.

That's a fictitious character.

So you have to assume the identity of somebody

who's a real person.

I'll give you some examples of how this works.

Suppose the police pull you over and your driver's license

is suspended.

So you know if you tell the cops who you are,

you're going to get arrested for driving on a suspended license.

Therefore, you give the police the name and date

of birth of your brother.

You pretend to be your brother so you can get out of trouble.

That would be false impersonation.

Or another example is online false personation,

and we see a lot of this.

There was a lawyer in San Bernardino who

had worked at the DA's office.

He got fired and he was very angry at his former employer.

So he actually created a fake Facebook account

in the name of his former boss purporting to be her

and posted a lot of inflammatory things purporting

to be from her-- posted by her.

Well, the police traced his IP address,

went and seized his computers, and busted him.

And this lawyer was ultimately prosecuted and convicted

and lost his license to practice law.