Stop Identity Theft » Internet

Ways to Avoid Identity Theft

admin — Mon, 10 May 2010 10:43:08 +0000

It’s such a sad fact of life today that we can’t trust anybody any longer. Unless identity theft had occurred directly to you or may be somebody you know, it is a common scene for individuals to consider it won’t occur to them.

Unfortunately unless you start to protect your personal info and privacy, anything can happen. Frequently buyers believe identity theft is carried out only by best master crooks that obtained access to banking computer files through an experienced hacker. No, a great deal of info thieving is secured through local crooks and could even be someone you know well.

Are you running a company? You have to know about the threat of identity theft, perhaps you have already been a sufferer of it. Did you know the way to prevent company so that you can safeguard your hard earned money? We will talk about the ways to prevent identity theft in the following part of this guide.

Business identity theft causes excellent losses to a lot of small and medium companies, and you will find constantly reports and gripes of company identity theft. If you want to know how to prevent company identity theft, you would much better to understand how a determine theft function. Usually, you will find offline and online ways for that identification robbers to obtain your business identification.

Yet another way to protect your identification is to never carry any personal information on you. So do not keep the ssn inside your wallet or even handbag. Just memorize the quantity.

If you have to write down your personal info then encrypt the quantity, so potential robbers cannot utilize it. Put simply, if your checking consideration amount is 5563123 then merely add a one to the start and closing of the quantity. This way you’ll realize that the correct checking consideration amount doesn’t have number 1 inside it, however the burglar will not.

Even though negative assessment, you will find things that you can do to reduce the possibility for others of Id theft. More to the point, you can also be ready to react when you discover that the financial info is stolen.

To reduce the possibility of theft, you need to shred any identifying info that you dismiss. These types of could be old bills or even other things along with Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, and so on. You should also have non-obvious security passwords on all of your computer systems (like, don’t use your middle identify as your password), and you need to have anti-theft software on the computer systems. You must ensure particularly which laptops and hand-held consumer electronics are password-protected with the most robust file encryption you can afford simply because these are the machines you are probably to get rid of.

A few more cautionary tips. Encrypt your cellular phone, and do not store your most sensitive financial info in your cellular phone. If you are promoting an old cellular phone or even laptop on ebay or even via another supplementary marketplace, pay out someone to ensure you really have stripped away all your old files that might contain financial info. Do not provide your credit card amount or even password to unidentified individuals who phone you on the telephone or even give back email solicitations. If you achieve an email caution about a consideration which ” is going to be suspended unless you contact all of us,” then contact which organization very first, and determine if your email is really a scam.

Right now, if you are cheated through Id theft and you figure it out, you have to contact all of your credit and financial accounts immediately and explain the issue. So it is best for those who have saved somewhere a summary of the accounts, the toll-free numbers, plus your consideration numbers. (Shop this somewhere Safe, not really in your laptop.) You should also be prepared to check every consideration a minimum of as soon as per month for two years, just to ensure someone strange has not occurred. Occasionally robbers attempt to buy as much things as you possibly can as quickly as possible, before you determine your credit info is stolen. Additional robbers will wait slightly whilst after a theft, after which attempt to enter into a financial account because they figure you have quit paying as much consideration, or even forgot about an old account.

Find out, more about identity theft protection here.

Tags: ways to prevent identity theft

Safety Of Personal Information With Online Social Networks

admin — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 07:49:45 +0000

The public and corporations both have concerns about social networks online, though the concerns of each are a bit different. The biggest worry on the part of public individuals is the safety of their personal data, and whether they have to worry about identity theft.

For companies who are busily doing business blogging and otherwise getting friendlier with customers, the worry is about how to maintain that more personal relationship without jeopardizing proprietary information.

The issue of personal information is a large concern indeed for social networking sites. In the same way that businesses recognize a potential gold mine in these networks, so do criminals, hackers and spammers. Spam, in fact, is probably the least of people’s worries.

The networks themselves are scrambling to make their sites as secure as possible, to stop people’s personal information being hacked and stolen. And the general public needs to engage in social media education to learn just what sort of information to post online, and what they should keep off the net altogether.

Businesses, too, need to keep their most crucial and private information safe from hackers. But they have the added concern about how to use social networks online to become more friendly with and responsible to customers, without going overboard and revealing too much.

Here, too, secrets can be divulged, after all. Social media optimization might mean using the new media to create better relationships with customers, but it doesn’t mean employees can divulge anything they want about the company.

Some groups now talk about enforced policies for social media strategy, to help “police” the multitude of online social networks and provide some protection. Businesses are setting up policies to govern what employees say online, even trying to limit what they say or do on their own time rather than company time.

Yet trying to enforce overly restrictive policies will undoubtedly kill the very positive, immediate benefits of using social media classes in the first place. These are separate issues, of course, from the question of hacking and security, which affect companies as well as individuals.

All of these issues demonstrate that social media today is still a very new thing, and everyone is taking awhile to find their place.

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Why Password Fatigue Is Aiding Computer Fraud

Michael Soliatis — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 12:49:26 +0000

Are you frustrated by the sheer number of passwords you have to remember for online transactions? If you’re like most people, you simply use the same ones over and over again, even though you know this is making you more vulnerable to theft and identity fraud. And the criminally minded are taking full advantage of our password fatigue to steal our personal information.

In fact, the problem of fraudulent and deceptive practices is becoming so why spread that many Internet privacy experts believe consumers are increasingly afraid to enter personal information online and may well lose confidence in ecommerce altogether. They believe a sea change in the way identities are stored, transmitted and verified online is essential if the growing problem of online fraud is to be thwarted.

This is a problem that Microsoft has been working hard to address and one that it hopes it has begun solving by including its new Cardspace system in its new Vista operating system.

The idea of Cardspace is that it is an “infocard” that enables web sites to verify a customer’s identity without needing to either receive or retain any personal or financial information.

It’s Microsoft’s plan that these identity cards would enable a bank to act as a middleman in an online purchase. The bank would send the merchant payment confirmation without transmitting a credit card number.

Internet users would be able to decide how much information is included on their identity card and be able to decide who gets to see it.

However, if this concept is to become universally accepted, Microsoft is the first to realise that it must be completely transparent across all operating systems (Windows, Mac, Linux, etc.) and be available on any device whether PC, PDA, cellphone, etc. Because only if it does will merchants readily accept it.

Of course all this will take time to implement but, if it doesn’t soon become a reality, the present increase in phishing and other fraudulent practices will only increase with the danger that ecommerce will decrease.

Michael Soliatis writes about the essential steps you should take to protect yourself from identity theft

Tags: deceptive practices, financial information, fraudulent practices, identity, infocard, internet privacy

Why identity theft is likely to get much worse

Michael Soliatis — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 08:57:14 +0000

In 2005 some ten millions residents of the USA were victims of identity theft with each one losing an average of about $7,000.

Clearing their name can take each victim a year during which time they’ll spend some 200 hours working on the problem (writing letters, making phone calls, etc.) at a personal cost of over $1,000 in expenses. That’s over a month of full time employment.

Even then a quarter of all victims will not succeed in clearing their name.

So how do identity thieves steal the personal information they use to such devastating effect?

Identity thieves will steal your mail, search through your trash, steal from your home, steal your purse or wallet.

And don’t imagine these identity thieves are always unknown to you because the people who have the easiest access to your belongings are people you let into your home or people you associate with at work, in clubs and in public place.

Identity thieves can also make use of public records and phone books. And these days many of these records are stored and easily accessed online.

Of course, some identity thieves will go to greater lengths by using easily available software programs to attack insecure networks or vulnerable home computers.

Having stolen your identity what do the thieves do with your personal information?

42% will steal from existing credit card accounts or spend money on a new account created in the stolen name.

20% will commit telephone or utility fraud.

13% will steal from an existing bank account or open a new account in the stolen name from which they can withdraw money.

9% will use the stolen identity to gain employment, 7% to obtain a loan and 6% to obtain documents such as a driver’s license, social security number or government benefits.

It behoves us all to take care of our identity, to treat it as something just as precious as other valuable belongings and to take all reasonable steps to ensure that others cannot steal it.

Author Michael Soliatis maintains that it’s essential to protect yourself from identity theft and avoid becoming a victim.

Tags: credit card accounts, social security, thieves, victims of identity theft

“Phishing” for Suckers: Two Things You Should Look For In An email

John Young — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 13:17:23 +0000

“For Your Immediate Attention! Don’t Lose Your Account! Update Immediately!”

Bob opened the email and was confronted by the logo of one of his major credit card companies. He had been carrying the card for some time, and had used it for a lot of online purchases.

Understandably he was concerned with the message under the logo: “Due to online identity theft, we need to verify that the information in your account is accurate, or we will be required by the FTC to suspend it”.

Below was an itemized list of the information he was required to verify: his old account number, name, address, telephone number, social security number, and mother’s maiden name. The also wanted him to change the password to his account.

Panicked, Bob hit the reply button and started filling in the information. He didn’t want to lose that account. He had set up several online accounts using that credit card number, and used it to buy and sell in online auctions…

THE “PHISHERMEN” AND THEIR HOOKS

“Phishing” is a technique used by identity thieves to stampede people into giving out their credit information online. The scam has been around for awhile, and, unlike Bob, most people are aware that they should never:

• Be intimidated by a message found in an “authentic looking” email

• Reply by giving vital information to the “phishers”

• Open up any links contained within the email, which can download “criminalware” onto their computer.

We all know these facts intellectually, but when confronted by an intimidating message, many of us react emotionally, not rationally. Maybe I’m more easily intimidated than most, but I’ve found myself opening an email and feeling compelled to fill out the information the message demands.

I have to confess an incident that occurred when I almost did that very thing. In my own defense, however, I have to say that it happened before I’d ever heard the term “phishing”. Fortunately I became suspicious before hitting the “Send” button.

But I almost did it. I almost sent it off and thereby gaffed myself.

THE LAKE IS GETTING CROWDED

Although the public is becoming savvier to this scam, the “phishermen” must be experiencing success because the Anti-Phishing Working Group, http://www.antiphishing.org/ reports that phishing incidents are on the upswing.

They list 28,571 consumer reported incidents in June 2006, almost double the reported numbers in June 2005.

More suckers are being “phished” than ever before, and as every honest fisherman knows, there is no bag limit on suckers.

HOW TO IDENTIFY LEGITIMATE EMAILS

Of course, the best thing to do when asked for vital information by someone purporting to be a legitimate credit card company or other institution is to call the company on the telephone and ask if the email in question does indeed come from them. Then, if it has, go to that site to change your information.

But there are a couple of “quickie” things you can look for in the email itself, which you should do if you are alarmed by the message and tempted to jump.

1. Check the “From” Address to see if the address is correct. It should come from a top level domain, i.e. ebay.com, not a sub domain such as ebay.security.com. A sub level domain can be obtained on line for free, and is not something a legitimate company would do.

2. Make Sure the “digital signature” is valid.

KNOW YOUR DIGITAL SIGNATURE

I don’t know if you’re like me, but my eyes glaze over when somebody mentions the words “digital signature”.

Basically, it’s just an electronic means of verifying that the email you received:

• Has originated from the source it claims to come from

• Hasn’t been intercepted and repackaged on the way.

An email that is “digitally signed” has a little red icon down in the lower left hand corner in the ‘To…From” box.

Click on that icon and you can find information about the sender. Be sure your email client is “S/MIME” compliant. “S/MIME” compliancy is supported by over 350 million email clients, including Microsoft Outlook, Lotus, Novel, Netscape and MacMail.

As noted on the antiphishing site, this is unspoofable for two reasons:

• It is strongly encrypted.

• It is generated when you open the email, not at the source

The email client has validated four things on receiving this email:

1. The email address in the “From” field matches the one in the digital certificate.

2. The certificate was issued by a trusted authority.

3. The message wasn’t tampered with in transit.

4. The certificate itself has not expired.

To put it simply, the certificate makes sure the email has indeed come from who it says it has come from, and hasn’t been tampered along the way.

To see what the certificate looks like, check out:

http://www.antiphishing.org/smim-dig-sig.htm

THREE WAYS TO PROTECT YOURSELF.

There are three good ways you can protect yourself from “phishermen.”

1. Call the company they supposedly represent. Don’t respond to alarming statements demanding personal information online.

2. Don’t open any links in the email. They can download “criminal ware” that can start gathering vital information off your computer.

3. Don’t open suspicious emails unless you have an “S/MIME” compliant email client and can view and open that digital icon.

LOOKING FOR SUCKERS

The phishermen are out there and still looking for suckers. Based on the rise in reported incidents they are still finding them. Armed with a little knowledge and a healthy awareness, you won’t end up in their “game bag”.

You definitely don’t want that…because the next stop is the frying pan.

John Young is a writer with a scientific and programming background. At the age of 62, he lives in California with his wife and pet cat “Bear”. His new book “Protect Yourself Against Identity Theft” can be found at:

www.youridentitystolen.com

Tags: credit information, identity theft, phishers, phishing, social security number

Identity Theft: Phishing in Dangerous Water

Daryl Campbell — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 05:50:10 +0000

Have you received one yet? You know. The email directing you to visit a familiar website where for some odd reason you’re being asked to update your personal information? The website asks you to verify your passwords, credit card numbers, social security number, or even your bank account. You recognize the company name as one that you’ve done business with in the past, so you click on the “take me there” link and proceed to provide all the information they’ve requested. No problem right? Except you find out much later that the website is a fraud. It was created for one reason: to steal your personal information. Welcome to the world of phishing.

Phishing (pronounced as “fishing”) means to send an email to a recipient falsely claiming to have an established, legitimate business. By fooling the recipient into giving their private information, the phisher has in effect stolen their identity.

It’s not easy to spot an email phishing for information. At first glance, the email may look like it is from a legitimate company. The “From” field of the e-mail may have the .com address of the company mentioned in the e-mail. The clickable link even appears to take you to the company’s website, but in fact, it is a fake website built to replicate the legitimate site.

Many of these people are professional criminals that have spent considerable time in creating emails that look authentic. Users need to review all emails requesting personal information carefully. When reviewing your email remember that the “From Field” can be easily changed by the sender. While it may look like it’s coming from a company you do business with, looks can be deceiving. Keep in mind that phishers will go all out in trying to make their emails look as legitimate as possible. They will even copy logos or images from the official site to use in their emails. They also like to include a clickable link which the recipient can follow to conveniently “update” their information.

How do you check to see if the link is authentic? Point at the link with your mouse, and then look in the bottom left hand screen of your computer. The actual website address to which you are being directed will show up for you to view. This is a fast and easy way to check if you are being directed to a legitimate site.

Also never and I mean NEVER click the links within the text of the e-mail. Delete the e-mail immediately and empty the trash box in all of your e-mail accounts as well. If you are truly concerned that you are missing an important notice regarding one of your accounts, then type the full URL address of the website into your browser. That way you can be confident that you are being directed to the true and legitimate website.

Phishing is a major weapon of choice for online identity thieves. Don’t get hooked.

Daryl Campbell’s website fightidtheft.winthemarket.com provides free tips,resources, featured articles from experts and up to the minute news concerning identity theft and fraud.

Tags: credit card numbers, professional criminals, social security number

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