Nine types of insurance fraud appear to be emerging as trends this year, according to the Coalition Against Insurance Fraud’s just released 2007 annual report.

Eight of the trends identified in the report involve thieves taking advantage of the unsuspecting. They include: claiming the loss of a home from arson to get avoid foreclosure; selling a vehicle to someone, then claiming it as stolen; lying about where a vehicle is registered to obtain lower premiums; medical fraud rings; using immigrants to fake injuries in crashes or to be fake patients in health schemes; misdirecting prescription drugs to junkies (insurance fraud, the group says, is “the leading financier of this large drug problem”); schemes to get workers’ compensation fraudulently; and medical identity theft to steal a victim’s health insurance.

The ninth is insurance agents taking advantage of the unsuspecting. The report says “a disturbing number [of agents] stole client premiums without buying the promised coverage. Others sold fake coverage, or conned elderly clients into giving up perfectly good life policies and buying expensive new coverage they did not need.” (The report does indicate that “most insurance agents are honest.”)

Insurance sales are based on trust. Buyers have to be able to trust the people whose advice they are relying on for important, potentially life-and-death decisions. That “a disturbing number” of insurance agents chose to abuse this trust is extremely alarming, but no more so than if it were just one agent. For if any agent’s actions raise concerns, then it’s the whole industry that deals with the consequences.