According to a report in Bloomberg, this type of credit fraud scam is increasing and could only get worse thanks to the data breach at credit scoring company Equifax. In the hack announced last Thursday (Sept. 7), the company said names, Social Security numbers and other information on 143 million consumers in the U.S. were potentially breached. This information could give identity thieves the means to meld the stolen data with new identities, possibly resulting in the opening of fake credit lines associated with fake identities.

The cybercrime technique, which wasn’t on the minds of law enforcement just five years ago, now accounts for as high as 20 percent of all credit card loans that go unpaid, reported Bloomberg, citing data from Auriemma Consulting Group. What’s more, synthetic identity theft may have cost banks $6 billion or more in 2016 alone. The crimes with fake identities are increasing at the same time credit card companies have gotten retailers of all stripes to roll out EMV-enabled payment systems. EMV chip cards are supposed to be harder to hack.