A 17-person federal panel created by U.S. President George W. Bush to study ways of fixing the nation's identity-theft problem published its final report of recommendations on Monday.

The 120-page report calls for consumer eduction, public-private cooperation and new legislation to make data more difficult to steal and use, while making it easier for victims to recover from the crime. Among the recommendations, the task force advocates better standards for data protection, less reliance on Social Security numbers, the creation of a joint law enforcement effort and more stringent laws, including criminalizing the creation and distribution of "malicious" spyware and keyloggers.

"There is no quick solution to this problem," wrote the task force's co-chairpersons, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Federal Trade Commission Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras. "But, we believe that a coordinated strategic plan can go a long way toward stemming the injuries caused by identity theft and, we hope, putting identity thieves out of business."

Identity theft has increasingly become a major threat to consumers in the United States, fueled in part by widespread data breaches. In 2005, 40 million credit-card numbers were put at risk by a breach of CardSystems Solutions' processing systems. In 2006, less than a week before President Bush signed the executive order establishing the task force, nearly 26.5 million personnel files stored on a laptop and external hard drive were stolen from the home of an employee of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. The laptop was later recovered.

Earlier this year, retail giant TJX Companies revealed that a series of breaches had compromised 45.6 million credit-card accounts, at least some of which have been used in fraud schemes.