These are both examples of the types of errors that may occur. Fraud occurs whenever someone else uses your social security number on a credit application. By doing this, the lender is accessing your credit report and will make a decision based upon it. If the person doing this is committing fraud, that person will use that credit card until it is full and then walk away from it. When the bank doesn't get paid, it reports to the credit reporting agencies that you are in default and you now have a negative credit entry through no fault of your own.
Abuses are a subset of fiscal missteps.
Basically abuses are usually credit card abuses. These abuses generally end in bankruptcy and destroy a person's credit rating for a very long time. The good news is that no matter which combination of the above problems faces you there are solutions. Any you will find that many of your personal problems can also be removed fairly easily. Given the turbulent nature of the economy where losing a job is a very real possibility, what can you do to further protect yourself.