In the digital age where credit card purchases are common place both online and at smaller stores, identity theft has become a household word.

The publishing industry is one that has been hit hardest in recent years.

Credit card debt is the most common form of debt in America. In 2006, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that there were 173 million credit card holders in the U.S. These 173 million held roughly 1.5 billion cards—an average of almost nine cards per person. The same data reported that in 2006, Americans “carried approximately $866 billion in credit card debt.”

Tax day is just around the corner, and for the millions of Americans who filed bankruptcy in the past fiscal year, there are several different complications to the already complicated filing process. The ways that bankruptcy affects tax filings varies greatly depending on the type of bankruptcy—and it’s not just bankruptcy that affects the tax code for an individual who has had financial insolvency issues in the fiscal year.

According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, more than 200,000 money-strapped households will use their tax refunds to pay for bankruptcy filings this year. In better years, tax refunds have been used for vacations, household gadgets, and family splurges. Yet the NBER research, according to USA Today, “confirms what bankruptcy lawyers have long known: At the first part of the year, when Americans receive their tax refunds, there almost always is a spike in personal bankruptcy filings.”

The Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act was passed in 2005, and, according to the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, included a clause that allows for an “individual Chapter 7 debtor [to] file an application for waiver of the filing fee along with the bankruptcy petition.”

It was about a year ago that, according to the Illinois Statehouse News, the state of Illinois was a prime candidate to file bankruptcy in the same way as its ailing businesses, an idea that had been tossed around Washington D.C. as a solution to the country’s economic woes.

Beef products company AFA Foods announced in early April that it was filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after its beef filler products were referred to publically as “pink slime,” a campaign some politicians have decried as a smear campaign to the entire beef industry, according to the Chicago Tribune.

According to a January article published in the Illinois Times, “Illinois citizens worrying about paying off their debts might now have to also worry about being thrown in jail if they do not pay.”

NBA All-Star Dwyane Wade has scored another victory in his highly contentious divorce from Siovaughn Wade.