Identity theft experts agree: It’s no longer a matter of if your personal and financial information will be exposed in a data breach, it’s just a question of when.
Data breaches were up 69% in the first half of 2008. Millions of Americans have been thrown into a state of panic when they received the dreaded data breach letter in the mail. But the 1.5 million Americans who have LifeLock protection know their credit is still safe, even after a data breach. (more…)
Joe Wurzelbacher initially shied away from the glare of celebrity, but soon his name was in all the major newspapers and on the lips of every TV broadcaster. Now most Americans know him better as “Joe the Plumber” and he seems to welcome the spotlight.
The problem with fame, though, is that soon people want to know even more about you. That must have been the motivation behind all the illegal searches of Joe’s Ohio state government records.
The Ohio State Highway Patrol is conducting an investigation into illegal searches involving Wurzelbacher’s records with the Cuyahoga County Child Support Enforcement Agency, the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services and the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles. (more…)
Just a piece of general advice to identity thieves: If you’re going to steal toy-drive donor checks, photocopy them, and use the information for your own purposes, don’t sort out the checks from the cops and target them. If only someone had given Phelecia Williams the same good advice.
Internships are meant to create career opportunities for young people, and apparently Williams saw that opportunity while she was interning in the Oakland mayor’s office. (more…)
Last week Florida’s attorney general Bill McCollum alerted parents to the widespread theft of children’s identities. He cited an estimate that 500,000 children a year fall victim to identity theft, but added that he suspected there were far more victims of child identity theft.
A recent study by Javelin Strategy and Research proves him right.
Incredibly, their study shows 5% of children have at least one credit report linked to their Social Security number, indicating that someone has applied for credit using their information. That’s at least one child in every school classroom. (more…)
A 15-year-old student at Shenendehowa Central School (NY) has been charged with three felonies after he accessed a database containing the personal information of 250 past and present transportation employees’ personal information including their Social Security numbers.
The hacker (obviously a bright kid) sent an e-mail reading “Look what I have” and signed “A Student” to the school principal, and was identified within a couple hours. (Well, maybe not that bright.) (more…)
North Carolina legislators did a fine job when they crafted their Identity Theft Protection Act in 2005 except for one detail; the law still allows anyone to request government records containing personal information.
In fact, the 2005 law doesn’t even require that county clerks of court redact personal information from records already posted on the Internet.
The new legislation did go a long way toward protecting North Carolinians.
But the new law didn’t do anything to protect North Carolinians’ personal information from North Carolina county officials. (more…)
Police in Plano, Texas have discovered at least 50 cases of gas station credit card fraud. Apparently, thieves have installed credit card readers called “skimmers” at the gas pumps.
Do you think you’re too smart to fall for this kind of attack? Do a little Internet research. Use your favorite search engine, and search on terms “cheap credit card reader.” Try “small credit card reader.” Look over some of the products advertised and available for purchase.
You’ll find that skimmers are easily available to criminals. They can be as small as a matchbox. They can be purchased for less than $15. They are virtually undetectable; even if you knew there was a skimmer at the gas pump, you’d have a hard time finding it.
For a little extra money, there are card skimmers available that actually send the stolen credit card information immediately to an accomplice’s cell phone. For a couple hundred dollars, you can buy a card reader than even writes the stolen information to blank credit cards. Several of the cards advertised on the Internet include free blank cards, making it even easier for identity thieves to start up their new businesses. (more…)
Some people respond to all the identity theft hysteria by taking all suggested precautions, and subscribing to a credit monitoring or identity theft protection service. Others listen to reports of identity theft and data breaches with skepticism, or even cynicism, believing the reports are hyped by the companies that benefit from it most – the companies that sell credit monitoring and identity theft services. (more…)
There have been two more data breaches in the past week that give more evidence of how vulnerable we all are to identity theft. In both cases, personal information was posted on public websites.
October 13: One thousand former students at Southwest Mississippi Community College were affected by a data breach. Their names, addresses, and in some cases, Social Security numbers were inadvertently posted on the Internet.
October 15: The City of Indianapolis posted the personal information of 3,300 people on their new website. The names, dates of birth and Social Security numbers of people who were charged with minor offenses in 2006 and in 2007 were part of a spreadsheet that was accidentally posted on the Internet. (more…)
Millions of baby boomers are facing a hard dilemma when their parents can no longer live alone. Assisted living facilities often cost $5,000 or more per month; even if there is space in your own home, some one will have to quit a job to take care of them; or, there’s the option of hiring a live-in or full-time caregiver.
Even if you hire someone through a licensed, bonded and insured agency, you still have to worry about identity theft. Although hacking gets a lot of attention, it’s only responsible for a very small percentage of identity theft cases. Someone known to the victims commits most identity theft crimes: an employee, a neighbor, a friend or relative. (more…)
