Search results matching tag 'preventing identity theft'

Speakers Series brings ID theft education to communities nationwide

IdentityTheft — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 14:56:00 GMT

Ah, the good old days, when we were innocent enough to believe buying shredders and taking our Social Security numbers off our checks was all we had to do to protect ourselves from identity theft.

Alas, the data breach and identity theft headlines make it clear those days are over. The Identity Theft Resource Center announces there were 656 reported data breaches in 2008. Verizon Business’ Data Breach Investigations Report reveals a total of 1,152 data breaches (70% of which were unreported) with more than 285,000,000 records compromised. And every day there are more reports of threats as low-tech as mail theft, or as high-tech as the attacks by international identity theft syndicates.

In light of the escalating identity theft risks, LifeLock has launched a program to bring identity theft education and prevention resources to communities nationwide. The LifeLock Speakers Series features Certified Identity Theft Risk Management Specialists who deliver free audience-tailored presentations to update groups on identity theft trends and protection strategies.

They’ve already delivered several talks in Texas, Michigan, North Carolina and the District of Columbia, but if you’ve missed those, the schedule below provides some additional opportunities.

If you’re interested in scheduling a speaker for your group (senior citizens, high school and college students businesses and law enforcement agencies are among the groups who’ve already been scheduled), or if you’d like more details about the dates below, contact Cortney Read at (480) 457-2032.

5/18 Newark, Delaware
5/18 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
5/18 Benincia and Escalon, California
6/8 Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio
6/8 Detroit, Michigan
6/15 Las Vegas, Nevada
6/15 Pasadena and Newport Beach, California
6/22 Reno, Nevada
7/06 Chicago, Illinois
7/13 Ann Arbor and Warren, Michigan
8/3 Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
8/10 Dallas, Texas
8/10 Orlando, Florida
8/10 Denver, Colorado
9/21 Seattle, Washington
10/12 Kansas City, Missouri
11/2 Tampa, Florida
12/1 Los Angeles and San Diego, California

Tax season tips for keeping your information safe

IdentityTheft — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 13:23:00 GMT

How can you tell it’s springtime? The daffodils are blooming; the pollen is pooling; the rivers are flooding; and millions of us are hunched over our computers trying to file our income taxes.

Unfortunately, as sure as springtime brings spring flowers, it also brings out a new crop of identity thieves looking to harvest taxpayers’ personal and financial information.

Heed to these simple tips to secure your information during tax season:

The IRS will never, NEVER contact you by email or phone requesting any information; if the IRS wants to contact you, they will only do so by mail. If you get an email this is purportedly from the IRS, delete it immediately without clicking on any links. Immediately hang up on callers who say they’re calling from the IRS.

If you’re hiring a tax preparer, do so carefully. Use only a reputable accountant or tax preparation firm.

If you’re preparing your own taxes online, make sure you have a full complement of security applications and firewalls installed and updated.

If you’re using file-sharing software (e.g. Lime Wire), delete it NOW.

If you’re sending your tax forms by snail mail, or will receive your refund in a mailbox, do not use your home mailbox. Use a post office box instead, even if you decide to rent it just during tax season.

Lock up all your tax-related documents where prying eyes and sticky fingers cannot access them. If you have to transport them, keep them locked in your car’s trunk. Never leave them on the seat of your car.

Shred any documents you don’t need. Buy the best shredder you can afford. Look for a micro-cut shredder because the same software to reconstruct shredded mail that government spies have used for years is available to anyone online for as little as $90 a month.

ID theft up 22% in 2008

IdentityTheft — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 02:24:00 GMT

More than 10 million Americans became identity theft victims in 2008, according to the annual report released by Javelin Strategy and Research last week. That's a huge increase over the 8.1 million victims of 2007, and the first time Javelin has reported an increase in the number of victims since they began tracking ID theft in 2003.

The report also confirms findings from early surveys regarding the source of personal and financial information used by thieves. Among the 35% of respondents who are certain who stole their information and how it was obtained,

    * 43% can trace the crime to a lost or stolen wallet, checkbook, credit card or other document.
    * 19% know that the information was stolen while they were making purchases or other transactions.
    * 13% knew the criminal as a friend, acquaintance or in-home employee.

Of the 10 million people who became identity theft victims last year, more than 1 million of them place the blame squarely on business or government institutions that lost information in data breaches.

Another 11% reported their information was stolen while they were online, mostly through the machinations of hackers, viruses or spyware. A few more of the victims admit to falling prey to phishing attempts.

It's nearly impossible to establish a causal relationship between the declining economy and increasing numbers of identity theft crimes, but there's certainly a correlation.

"The short story is that criminals are getting more desperate," said Jim Van Dyke, a Javelin spokesman.

Almost 600,000 people lost their jobs during the first week of February, the same week the report was released.

If there's any good news to be found in the report, it's that the average out of pocket loss for an ID theft victim is down to only $500.

Beware of "free" money from credit card companies

IdentityTheft — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 18:10:00 GMT

Free money! Who can resist an unsolicited $10 check that just appears in the mailbox like manna? The answer is, anyone with young eyes or bifocals easily within reach; the fine print (and it is very fine and very faint) is the deal killer.

A recent example was found in a coworker’s mailbox. In this case, the fine print reveals that cashing the check automatically and immediately enrolls the endorsee in a yearlong membership in Great Fun, a discount program offered to “valued Travelers Advantage members.” Great Fun savings include deep discounts at restaurants, hotels and stores, PLUS 2% back on $5,000 worth of credit card purchases. What a deal!

Now, get out the bifocals. The annual membership begins with a free 30-day trial period, but members’ credit cards are automatically billed for an additional 11-month membership. And, at the end of that first year, an annual fee of $139.99 will be automatically charged to your credit card. And in all subsequent years, your credit card will be automatically charged at whatever the current rate is at the time.

To be fair, there is a limited opportunity for the “valued member” to cancel their Great Fun membership during the 30-day trial period by calling a toll free phone number. To be frank, the program is a product of Trilegiant, a corporation with a history of consumer complaints and class action lawsuits pertaining to unauthorized credit card charges and members’ enrollment in Trilegiant programs without informed consent.

Stolen mail and identity theft: they go together like peas and carrots

IdentityTheft — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 20:59:00 GMT

Like Forrest and Jenny, peas and carrots, methamphetamine addicts and identity theft goes together. It was true when the U.S. Department of Justice released the 2007 intelligence bulletin from the National Drug Intelligence Center linking increasing identity theft to increasing meth use, and a recent case in Seattle indicates the link is still strong.

Kristofer Jensen used the stolen identities of more than 40 people to support his meth addiction between January 2007 and March 2008. His primary source for his victims’ personal information was their stolen mail.

Using that information he made fake ID cards bearing his victims’ names but his photo. He then used those IDs to withdraw more than $200,000 from their bank accounts. In March 2007 he hit one bank account 15 times. In August 2007 Jensen made a single $11,500 withdrawal from one account. Jensen netted another $14,000 from another victim’s account at First Tech Credit Union in Washington County Oregon.

Jim Dunn, a detective with the Thurston County Sheriff’s office in Washington estimated that 95% of the ID theft cases he worked were related to meth addiction. The addicts would steal mail and trade the personal information harvested from it for meth to feed their addictions, and cash to cover their basic living expenses.

Jensen received a 10-year prison sentence last Friday in the Seattle U.S. District Court.

Protecting your identity from mail theft is easy: use a locked U.S. Postal Service mailbox to send and receive your mail. If you have a hard time excepting the inconvenience of using a mailbox away from home, use a locking mailbox to receive mail, and send out your mail from a USPS drop box.

Las Vegas mortgage broker faces federal charges for dumping applications

IdentityTheft — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 20:20:00 GMT

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure … or it might be another man’s mortgage application, credit report, tax returns or bank statements. In this case, it’s the basis for charges filed by the Federal Trade Commission.

Gregory Navone, a Las Vegas mortgage broker, stored in his garage roughly 40 boxes of mortgage applications, tax returns, bank statements, photocopies of driver’s licenses and credit cards, and at least 230 credit reports. After that, he threw them all in a public dumpster.

The boxes of documents were found December 20, 2006 by a neighbor who’d complained before about loose trash and litter blowing into his yard from the nearby office building’s trash containers. A closer look revealed that the papers came from First Interstate Mortgage, which had an office just down the street.

Navone was registered as the president of First Interstate Mortgage, and First Interstate Realty and BNG LLC, which had offices at the Decatur Boulevard address where the documents were found.

The FTC filed a complaint with in the U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada on Dec. 30, 2008.

Navone is charged with violating the Fair Credit Reporting Act and the Disposal Rule because he didn’t take reasonable care in protecting consumers’ information. And, because he gave his clients a written statement assuring them that the companies maintained “physical, electronic, and procedural safeguards that comply with federal standards to store and secure information about you from unauthorized access, alteration and destruction” (though apparently the companies didn’t), Navone is also charged with violating the FTC Act.

Obama inauguration spam

IdentityTheft — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 22:11:00 GMT

Barack Obama’s inauguration has inspired millions of people, including cyber crooks bent on identity theft.

Watch out for headlines like “Barack Obama refused to be president of the United States of America,” and “There is no president in the USA anymore”; they’re linked to malicious software called “netbots” that automatically invade your computer and steal your information. They also “worm” their way into the computers of everyone else in your address book or anyone else you connect with online.

Just hours after Obama was elected last November, millions of email inboxes received spam with “Obama acceptance speech” in the subject line, enticing millions of people to click on the link, thinking they’d get a chance to read the transcript. What they got instead was a nasty Trojan horse malware installed on their computers. When that happens, any information on the computer—bank account information, credit card statements, Social Security numbers, etc—is captured and sent back to a remote computer.

To avoid an invasion, follow these rules:

If you receive an email with a tempting subject line like “You’re a winner” don’t open it; just delete it.
If you receive an email that instructs you to provide personal or financial information by clicking on a link, delete it. Even if it seems to be from a reputable source—your bank, credit card company, or the IRS—delete it. It’s been said a million times already: no financial institution or government agency will ever send you an email requesting that your information be submitted via email or the Internet.

Don't give out personal information to strangers over the phone, and never use power tools for acts of personal hygiene

IdentityTheft — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 21:30:00 GMT

It’s hard sometimes to give people advice without sounding condescending. For instance, if I said not to stick a fork in an electrical outlet, some people would be offended. A well-intended warning about the dangers of simultaneously showering and blow-drying your hair might make some people a little huffy.

But you know there are people out there who must be cautioned … repeatedly. So don’t kill the messenger; I’m just passing along a warning from the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

Don’t give out personal information to strangers who call you on the phone. Don’t give them your Social Security number, your bank account number, your credit card number, the routing number or the time of day.

Apparently the old “You missed jury duty” scam has reared its ugly, old gray head again. It goes like this: Somebody calls claiming to be from your local courthouse, and says they’re calling the jury duty you missed.

If you get indignant about never having been summoned for jury duty, the caller will ask for your date of birth, then make noises as if he’s checking that against his records. Then he’ll ask for your Social Security number. By that time he has all he needs to open new credit in your name.

Or, sometimes, the caller will tell you there’s a fine for failing to appear for jury duty, and that if you don’t pay it right away an arrest warrant will be issued. You can, of course, pay by credit card over the phone …

And if you ever hear of someone you know falling for this scam, issue a kind and patient reminder about the dangers of cleaning out one's ears with a power drill. They might have forgotten that one.

Child identity theft leaves longlasting scars

IdentityTheft — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 20:18:00 GMT

“Childhood is what we spend the rest of our lives overcoming.” Amy Bennett

We’re all at least a little scuffed up by the time we leave childhood behind. The unmitigated cruelties of other children, the injustices meted out by exasperated parents and the bitter rivalries among siblings leave scrapes and bruises on our psyches. The luckiest among us suffer psychic injuries no greater than those left on our knees by our first intercourse with two-wheelers.

Other children aren’t as lucky. Besides the crimes of abuse, children can also carry the scars of childhood identity theft into adulthood. A child’s family members--most frequently the parents--usually commit childhood identity theft. The crime usually goes undetected until the child is entering adulthood and attempting to acquire credit for the first time.

Zach Friesen found out he was a victim of childhood identity theft at 17 when he was denied a job a stock clerk. When Zach was only seven someone else had stolen his identity and used to finance a $40,000 houseboat, but never made the payments. He later learned that his absent father was the perpetrator. Friesen spent two years clearing his identity, and another 10 years trying to clean up his credit record.

Family members aren’t the only ones to target children. Every time a child’s personal information is given out for school, daycare, sports programs and medical, another opportunity for theft is created.

The Federal Trade Commission estimates that 500,000 children become victims every year, but they don’t track childhood identity theft separately, so they can only estimate. What they do know is that the number of reported incidents is climbing. Three percent of all complaints in 2003 were about people under 18; in 2004 that climbed to 4%, and climbed again to 5% between 2005 and 2007.

What you can do
At least once a year request a credit report in your child’s name from all three credit reporting agencies. There shouldn’t be one for a minor. If a credit report exists, contact the police to report the crime, and notify the credit bureaus that your child is a victim of identity theft.

Tax season, Part IV: Data breach risks

IdentityTheft — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 18:06:00 GMT

The first three installments focused on identity theft risks over which you have considerable control: your mail, your household and your email. This final installment pertains to the risk of a computer data breach that exposes your personal and financial information and leaves you vulnerable to identity theft, and that’s entirely out of your control.

The smattering of fearful Luddites who don’t file their taxes electronically can be reassured. Since Turbo Tax became available for paperless tax filing in 2001 there has been only one report of information exposure. A Nebraska woman searching for her past tax records in 2007 discovered she could view the records of other taxpayers with similar names. (The woman’s name has never been revealed because of security reasons. We can only pray that her last name wasn’t Smith or Jones.) Turbo Tax immediately fixed the glitch, and there were never any resultant identity theft cases.

If you are involved in a tax-related data breach this year, it will most likely occur at the Internal Revenue Service. In 2007, the Treasury Inspector General reported that the IRS lost track of almost 500 laptops in 387 separate security breaches affecting an untold number of taxpayers. Also in 2007, 26 IRS computer tapes went missing after they were delivered to City Hall in Kansas City. Again, an untold number of taxpayers’ personal and financial information was exposed.

Though the common perception is that hackers are the biggest threat to our electronic information, the Identity Theft Resource Center just reported that of the 110 federal, state and local government data breaches in 2008, hackers executed only 5%. Employees and subcontractors are to blame for the rest.

Conclusion

You know what they say about death and taxes: You can't avoid either of them. Unfortunately, they could say the same about data breaches. But you can significantly decrease your chances of becoming a tax season identity theft statistic. Protect your mail. Secure your personal finance records. Beware of phishing. Enroll in a comprehensive identity theft protection service because, like death and taxes, data breaches happen. Research and compare the most popular identity theft services. Be sure to look for one that monitors the websites, chat rooms and online forums where stolen identities are bought, sold and traded. To my knowledge LifeLock is the only one that provides this, but there may be others.

Happy filing.