<prompt> Human: Posting from a throwaway account for personal reasons.Im a longtime lurker of rpf and have read tons of horror stories involving peoples finances and their families. I never thought it would happen to me or someone so close to me.Today my girlfriend found out that her parents took out a federal student loan with her name on it a few years ago. That loan was used towards paying her tuition at a university. There has never been any sort of payment made. She found this out after checking her credit score and seeing that it was 417. She doesnt have any credit cards, no overdue medical bills, and no sort of other debt. The only thing on her report is a delinquent account for a federal loan that is past due. It seems like her parents arent accepting responsibility for this at all. Theyre claiming that since she dropped out of the university to go to a community college they thought they wouldnt have to pay the loan, I call bs on this. Theyre successful small business owners who own a house, have car payments, etc. Im sure they know exactly how a loan works.Where should she go from here? Is this fraud? Identity theft? She called some credit bureaus today and it was suggested to her that she file a police report, what are the proscons of this? besides the obvious damage to family relations Does she start paying off this loan asap? If she does, should it be payed as aggressively as possible?I should mention the following things:Were currently trying to find out whether or not her parents cosigned for this loan, we should be finding this out tomorrow morning. The loan is under 10k. Also, shell be reading your comments so feel free to speak directly to her, well both be responding via this account.Thanks in advance rpf, youve always helped point me in the right direction when it comes to my finances. I constantly tell my girlfriend about all the things I learn from this subreddit Im sure you can come through for her.  <response>: That loan was used towards paying her tuition at a university. To me, it seems like they put the money to good use. It was used on her, not on things like an expensive holiday for themselves. That gives them some credit, if you ask me. I mean, they arent amazing dream parents for it they still hid this from her and didnt make payments, but at least your girlfriend got to use that borrowed money. I think I would first ask her parents, now that they know that the loan needs to be paid, whether they want to chip in on those payments? They may say yes....Then, I would start making regular payments on the loan, with or without the parents help. And of course, change all the contact information to hers. Generally speaking, often for student loans, after two years of regular payments the delinquency status is lifted from the loan. After that, she may also be able to refinance to a lower interest rate. I would also let her freeze her credit report with all three credit reporting agencies. That way, they cant do it again. If she ever needs credit she should probably get a secured credit card to help her rebuild her score, she can temporarily unfreeze her credit report by providing the credit reporting agency with a password. Finally, I want to point out that your gfs parents are letting her live at home. That is worth something. And they dont have to do that, with an adult child. They could ask her to move out. Her being able to stay at home for free I assume...? is probably worth over 500month, compared to your gf having to live on her own. So even if they dont want to help her pay the loan, she should know that thanks to them she has extra financial room to actually pay down that loan. 