It can be said a person should be proud to be the only person born with their identity. You are unique, given a name by your proud parents. You work hard for the monies in your account. You should expect plenty of benefits from your SSS when you reach retirement age.

Yet, some people feel it necessary to steal your hard worked earnings by taking on your identity. How would you feel by this? What would you life be like then? No doubt all these bring a fear that someone will damage your reputation, your life and your security.

Many people don’t want to grow old without some kind of security but everyone must work together to keep identity thieves from getting what they want. These thieves don’t deserve a cent for their hacker time.

People are starting to fight back. They are beginning to demand their government to secure their identities more carefully. If identity theft wasn’t so prevalent, then there would be no reason for this.

Identity theft is a grave miscarriage of justice for people affected because their personal information and property were compromised. It is only right that they seek justice to combat this growing epidemic.

Every precaution should be taken to protect people’s identity. Once this is done, thieves can do little to steal it from you. This can make people take a little comfort that no one can be them.

No doubt if the person behind the first attack of identity theft were ever found, people would want to seek justice behind their stealing abilities. Many people would want that person to suffer as they have suffered.

From one person to a group of people to many others, identity theft and all the fraud that comes with it has no doubt fanned out. The FBI or rather the Federal Bureau of Investigations have found it harder than easier to get rid of this problem.

Since the thieves have been able to stay one step ahead of the authorities, it makes it harder for the FBI agents to track them down.

Not only that but the fraud is growing rapidly on the Internet. Should you be looking to buy a high priced item on a website, be sure to investigate it to see if it is legit or not.

Some of his fraudulent websites will offer the products, like Ipods or high end cell phones, at a drastic reduced costs or close to free.

When a person is trying to scam someone, they advise people not to pay for anything until they receive the product. However, what will happen is they will take the name of the person buying and take it from the account of another to purchase the prize from the legit site.

Basically, once the person pays for the item, the money is transferred to the thief. The scammer can still present a copy of the receipt to the buyer although the money is coming from another account number.

E-mail fraud is also running rampant. What is this type of fraud? When an e-mail is sent to you from a scammer, they often times place a link. The e-mail would seem as if it is coming from a place of business that you contend with on a regular basis.

The scammer will ask for all kinds of information including social security number, full name, mother’s maiden name and your date of birth.

Are you starting to understand how this type of fraud works? So before you fall victim, take precautions early to avoid being a prey to those thieves.

By: Abhishek Agarwal

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Identity theft is becoming a serious problems in all corners of the globe, and with the advancement of technology like the internet, new ways to steal your identity are coming about every day. It is becoming harder and harder to protect yourself from this crime and ensuring your personal data is safe is becoming a constant struggle. You wouldn’t want to give your personal details to a complete stranger, but the reality is, you are doing this every time you sign up to a social networking site.

This really occurs mostly with the younger generation that use these social networking sites as a way of meeting new people and communicating with their friends. On signing up to these sites, they are asked to provide names, addresses, contact telephone numbers, dates of birth and schools they attended. This sort of information is being viewed by people that are viewing their profiles, and only a few of the sites have a scheme where your profile cannot be viewed unless you specifically add them as a friend. Many of the users of the sites add other users as friends with no real idea who they are. That is the worst thing about the internet, it allows you to be who you want to be and come up with characters.

Think of the ways that these social networking sites can be used as a focus for identity theft. The majority of the users post their birth date and this is a question commonly asked by banks to determine a person’s identity. Combined with the full name and also things like pet names, Mother’s maiden name and other such information, it doesn’t take a genius to work out the rest. Not only can information be stolen this way, but names can be searched on internet search engines and information can be found that way. A person could also try to be added to your friends list, without you actually knowing who they are and discreetly ask questions in conversations, such as home address, and other personal information that can be used to perform identity theft.

This carefree attitude to private details not only puts the users of the sites at risk, but also the people that they live with are put wide open to the risk of identity theft. If a child or young person gives away personal information over the internet on these social networking sites, their parents or guardians are at an increased risk of identity theft. A few carefully asked questions, randomly dropped into conversation are encouraging the users of these sites to give away details that they wouldn’t normally give away. What’s your Dad’s name? Where do you live? When’s your birthday? How old are you? A pattern emerges. These are questions that could commonly be seen as friendly conversation, but can very often lead to the exchange of details that could potentially be used in the cases of identity theft.

The unbelievable thing is that many of these sites have been under scrutiny in the media for the public access of personal information, but still it goes on. More and more people are signing up under recommendation of their friends and family meaning that thousands, sometimes millions, of people are left wide open to the risks that identity thieves that may be operating can pose.



By: Bernard Pragides

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Crime like any other business is always constantly changing and evolving to the various nuances of the market and is one of the world’s best industries for relying upon new technology to better facilitate its goals. With the advent of the internet and the sudden massive increase in online banking and the increasing prevalence of financial and retail services being offered via the internet this has meant that criminals have now found a an entirely new captive audience in which to steal from. Identity theft is fast becoming one of the most significant and harmful threats to the online user, and the economic losses it results in both the victim and for the wider economy is staggering.

Identity theft as the name would perhaps first suggest is whereby a criminal illegally obtains a person’s personal details and then uses those details in order to engage in purchases or other retail services. The end stage objectives of identity theft range from petty larceny and fraud, to more worrying crimes such as mass scale money laundering. Because it is the victims details that are being used, the thief need only concern themselves with using the personal details for as long as possible before the authorities and or victim should happen to realize what is going on.

Identity theft is an issue that is especially dangerous via the internet in part due to the ever increasing so and desperate lengths that criminals and fraudsters will go to in order to steal a person’s personal details. One of the most common scams currently being used is so called “phishing” whereby a prospective victim is sent an email which claims to be from either their bank, PayPal or some other form of monetary or credit service.

The structure is typically the same, the victim is sent a rather pointed letter purporting to be from the respective agency concerning some issue with their account and with the email concluding that they should use a link contained within the email to change their password and username. As the unsuspecting victim goes to check the link they are then redirected to a phishing site which is made to resemble the relevant website, and which will actually log the details.

If you do happen to receive a suspicious email and it does contain a link to a webpage/site which you are uncertain about then hover the mouse arrow over the url, this will result in a small box appearing which will clearly display the real url and if the two do not match then it is obvious that the hyperlink has been masked and thus is fraudulent.

Such trickery can easily be avoided, banks as a rule do not email customers about such a sensitive issue over the internet for exactly this reason. If the email happens to be rather pushy or overly demanding, requiring you to change your details within a narrow time frame then there is a very high chance that this is indeed a fraudulent email.

Many email services such as yahoo mail and Hotmail already have very powerful and effective anti-phishing programs present within their services and so this will be typically enough to beat nearly all phishing attempts. Common sense and awareness are paramount to safeguard against you becoming a victim.

Whenever you do need to log onto a site where sensitive details will be used and submitted, make sure you are using a secured site. Secured sites are easily spotted because in the web address bar which contains the url for the relevant site will have https:// as opposed to http. That little s may not seem like much, but rest assured such sites will make use of very powerful encryption technology to dissuade and block dangerous users.

Viruses and more specifically key loggers are also another computer related danger, and a danger which can pose a threat because of their usage as a tool for committing identity theft. Key loggers are programs that will record all of the keys pressed by a user with such data then stored and sent discreetly to the creator who can then check for passwords and other pertinent details. Key loggers are classified as a virus (also known as a Trojan horse) and so any reliable antivirus program will be enough to help protect you from this particular threat.

Key loggers and spyware are most commonly found in porn sites, mp3 sites and peer to peer networks where people file share copyrighted material. If you do use these sites, please make sure that you have adequate protection running in the background so as to safeguard against any such risks. Prevention is better than the cure and with internet security and safety never have truer words been uttered so you may want to refrain from using such potentially dangerous sites.



By: Nicholas Boler

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One thing you can be proud of always is your self-identity — your individual difference among other persons. It reflects your whole being and your personality in general. It also shows your uniqueness with other people. It is something that cannot be stolen from you.

However, nowadays other people can steal your personal identity already?

Yes. You should be alarm with this fact. Maybe due to the continuous search of men for wealth, they happen to commit this kind of calcification to the point that they are already intervening in someone privacy, the personal identity of others.

This is how worse the situation is in the world today. Imagine having your identity stolen by others and used for criminal acts. Is it not a grave offense and a deep insult in your person? Identity theft evolved when there is numerous numbers of people already practicing this form of violation.

Identity theft is indeed a crime of a different kind of dye. In simple term, it is the stealing of your personal identity. It can be comprise of your identification information. It will include your SSS number, licenses data, bank accounts, your full name and other details that reveal your identity.

Are these people gaining benefit from you? Precisely yes. Those people who are stealing someone identity can profit a lot. Just take it as an example, if another person knows your bank account number and your full name, he can make transaction with the bank. In other words, he will be given the privilege to withdraw from your money.

There are many ways on how you can prevent yourself from being one of the victims of identity theft. Aside from the personal means that you can do it by yourself, you can also engage in the so-called fraud alert. Try to know more about it.

However, you are not yet aware about identity theft, it is necessary that you apply your credit file with fraud alert. This is one way to protect your account from being stolen by other people especially if they are attempting to do so.

Fraud alert refers to something attached to your credit report. This is usually done by most of the major credit bureaus where you are connected. This fraud alert works simple. If there is someone, who is going to make transaction concerning your account the credit bureau will make an immediate call after you.

This will be a prior notification for you. If in case the call cannot reach you, it only means one thing that, your account should not be opened. This will somehow inform the credit company that the person is not really given the authority to make transaction on his account.

It is easy to set up your fraud alert. All you need to do is to coordinate with the fraud alert department op the credit bureau that you are engaging. Afterwards, you can simply notify them to top flag your credit file for fraud. To secure this, you will be asked to record your voice in an automated voice response system because this will be utilized when they are calling you.

If it there comes a time when you already want to remove the fraud alert not flagged in your credit file, you can immediately inform them requesting for a removal through writing. It is necessary that you should place your full name, SSS number, your current and previous addresses, the date of your birth, and your contact number. You have to send it on the fraud alert department of the credit bureaus where you apply your fraud alert.

Fraud alert is a big help for the security of your account. However, you should also beware that sometimes fraud alter is disregarded by some creditors. If you are a previous victim of identity theft or you know that somebody is planning against your account, fraud alert can help. Nevertheless, you also need to check on your credit report if it is still updated.

Securing your identity is the most important thing that you should always put into consideration. Do not let these thefts conquer your privacy. They do not deserve a wealthy living with their kind of act!



By: Dwayne Garrett

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There is no excuse for forwarding what I call friendly spam which is junk email from known contacts which appears convincing, but is actually spam. Small business owners should be cautious, or you may risk loss in credibility. In most cases the spam contains an alarming message quoted from a supposedly credible source that shocks the reader and requests that you forward this to everyone you know.

Unwittingly many small business owners forward junk email without a second thought. Did they really leave out “In God We Trust” on the new US one dollar coin? No. It’s stamped on the edge of the coin not on the flat surface. Sometimes the message is an apparent windfall like this one. Will Microsoft track your chain letter email and send you $250 for each person who receives it as part of a new test? No. It’s false, and impossible. There is no way they could track and collect your outgoing email recipient addresses.

The junk themes are ageless. In some cases recycled messages that circulated more than 5 years ago get sent years later in the original and identical form or with a slight revision or current twist. You can and should do something about this every time you get a message that is questionable.

My advice for everyone including small business owners is visit the Urban Legends website and do a search on key words in the topic of any email you receive begging you to forward it to everyone you know. Urban Legends at www.snopes.com is my choice for debunking false emails. They track and investigate vast numbers of email hoaxes and give detailed reports on each with either a true or false conclusion. It is extremely rare that I search a suspicious message and find out that Urban Legends determined it was not a hoax, but that happens, too.

Tip: When you do have reason to mass email a message, address the message to you or your company as the recipient as well as the sender, and then enter all your contacts in the BCC field. The BCC is like the CC (carbon copy), but it is a “blind” carbon copy which means recipients will not see the names and email addresses of everyone else in your email address book. How embarrassing it would be if your everyday contacts were sent to a spammer or someone more devious who sends people viruses.

Do your part to protect your contacts. Check out the background of stories you receive in any urgent message before participating in mass mailing. You can help avoid the problem of wasting internet bandwidth with junk. The risk to your credibility with business contacts deserves caution.

Do you avoid forwarding shocking email messages, but still receive these from known contacts? Try to be gentle when you identify a hoax, and encourage your contacts to use the search option at Urban Legends. Sorting personal and business email is enough work without unwittingly becoming a spammer.

Here’s some advice for unfriendly spam. First, some offer an unsubscribe option near the bottom of the message. Never reply to be removed from their list. If you don’t know them there’s a good chance they will remove you after sending or selling your email address to another spammer. Your reply to unsubscribe just confirmed your email is active and current. Don’t reply.

Unsolicited spam junk mail is just as frustrating as those from known contacts, yet easier to identify. There are ways to fight back. Scripts may be used to disguise your email address. View mine from my website or blog by mousing over the “email me” link in the list of links, and then in the lower address bar of your browser you can see my email address. However, it is coded such that spambots cannot read the address to harvest it and add my email information to junk email lists.

What can you do if you don’t have email addresses “hidden” on your website? Ask your designer to locate a free script to “cloak” your email so it cannot be collected. That takes care of your website. You still need to monitor and control how you handle your email inbox. Share any tips or advice you learn here with your contacts that may fall victim to hoax emails, as well.

In conclusion, laws are weak because spammers are moving targets who sometimes skip from state to state, or open up shop in foreign countries with ease. Do your part to protect your small business contact information, and avoid forwarding any message before confirming the truth behind the story.



By: Jim Degerstrom

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Identity theft is a crime used to refer to fraud that involves someone pretending to be someone else in order to steal money or get other benefits. With the digital age, identity theft is a major problem world-wide involving BILLIONS of dollars in theft. The term is relatively new and is actually a misnomer, since it is not inherently possible to steal an identity, only to use it. But, that’s not the direction I want to go.

I want to talk about identity fraud and I see 2012 as a possible solution.

Identity fraud has involved many major players. The government and our schools have been key promoters of identity fraud; however, the biggest culprit must be the church and various religious institutions. The grand RIP OFF is that we have never really been told WHO we ARE! The church has come close from time to time but ultimately falls back into a duality paradigm, eating from the tree of good AND evil.

Who are you and where did you (and I) come from anyway? Tell us the truth.

The distorted image that we’ve been given is that we came from mommy’s tummy, that we’re screwed up from the get-go (can you say original sin?), and that we’re human beings! The church, schools, and governments spend all their efforts in programming us to BELIEVE that we are to become GOOD CITIZENS, to become good HUMAN BEINGS. No one dares speak of our true identity which is that we are SPIRIT BEINGS!

The government doesn’t know how to do that maybe because that’s not their primary role; however, if the church isn’t doing it then who should? Who is going to tell me who I really AM (capital letters on purpose)? Much effort is spent on riding society of physical, emotional, and mental abuse. But what about identity abuse- identity fraud?

Society as a whole is rising in consciousness and exponentially so. So, neither government, nor other institutions will be able to hold back the tide. A tipping point is around the corner and it may just happen around 2012- maybe even December of 2012? 

Dr. Hawkins is an internationally renowned psychiatrist, physician, researcher, and pioneer in the fields of consciousness research and spirituality. He writes and teaches from the unique perspective of an experienced clinician, scientist, and mystic and is devoted to the spiritual evolution of mankind and his research has shown a dramatic increase in “cultural consciousness” over the last twenty years. Something is happening. Something very, very big is rumbling from within the spirit of mankind and it’s not Mount Redoubt about to blow.

Everything, absolutely everything is energy, vibrations, and resonance. The vibrational frequency is speeding u. Even the heart beat of the earth is increasing its frequency quickly from 7.8 to over 12 now. What’s it all mean? If I knew could hit it big now couldn’t I? But, at the least let me suggest that we’re coming into a new era, a new sun as the Hopi and Mayans wrote, and a self-awareness that we have a dab (a little dab will do you) of the divine, God consciousness within us and the true SELF is starting to be seen.

When’s the last time you looked in the mirror- without a veil, into a more clear mirror?

Who is that person?

By: Ernie Fitzpatrick

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No one likes to admit it, but by January 3rd. each year we’ve mostly forgotten or postponed our well-intentioned New Year’s resolutions of self improvement. How many of us have chosen ‘losing weight’ as one of our personal pledges? Although a healthier lifestyle is an admirable goal, I will suggest that the most critical resolution is that we take steps to ensure the weight we lose is not from our bank account or our hard drive. Personal security in all areas of our lives should be resolution number one. It does not matter that New Year’s Eve is history and this wasn’t on your list, getting yourself protected and your data backed-up securely is no longer something anyone should put off.

Our electronic world is fraught with external computer threats and internal software and hardware problems. Viruses and Trojans batter your firewall relentlessly and at some point almost every hard drive will fail. It is not a question of if it will happen to you, but when it will happen. In addition, this brave new world of ours offers universal Internet access. Criminals behind bars and the criminal who lives down the block can find their way into your home or your business and plunder your electronic records. If the bad guys don’t get you, their malicious viruses eventually will – it’s only a matter of time.

The objective of every person who owns a computer must be bulletproof security for personal data, protection of our personal identity and all related digital information. There is no more important resolution you can make than to protect yourself and your family from digital loss or theft. To make matters worse, managing and organizing our personal data is getting increasingly more complex. We store our data on our desktops, copy updates from our laptops and try to juggle everything between our Blackberry or cell phone.

For the average non-techie user (that would be most of us), this data dance is reaching the ‘out of control’ stage. Fortunately there are a number of things we can do using inexpensive or free products and services to help wrangle this back under control. As a small business consultant and one who earns a living online, I was forced to discover a solution that was secure, convenient, scalable and cost effective. After security, my primary issue was the convenience factor; I needed something that was basically automatic. I have forgotten to backup critical files in the past and I’ve lost a number of hard drives over the years, and I never want to relive those experiences.

The following recommendations are not hypothetical or offered purely as well meaning advice, this is how I manage, backup, protect and sync my data with inexpensive products and services that I use every day.

Data Backup:

My desktop computer performs a full hard drive backup as I sleep using a remote backup service called Mozy. I have talked about Mozy in previous articles that are available on my website. Mozy is 100% automatic, secure and incredibly economical! They use 128-bit SSL encryption during the data transfer process, which is the same method banks use. 448-bit Blowfish encryption secures your files on their servers keeping your data safe from hackers. Mozy backs up your files whether they’re open or closed and it backs up Outlook files providing disaster-proof email protection. World-class unlimited backup, state-of-the-art security, automatic administration and 100% peace of mind will set you back a whopping $4.95 per month. Duh! That shouldn’t require much thought.

I am not paranoid about data loss (well maybe a little), but in addition to Mozy I sometimes employ a local backup. There are occasions where I have created important documents, written chapters in a book or made site-wide changes to a website and it could be many hours before Mozy begins its nightly backup. In such cases I will do a quick backup to an external drive such as a Maxtor or Flash drive. If you have ever accidentally lost a document that you slaved over for hours… you’ll understand.

Data Synchronization:

Once you have put your main data backup service in place, you’ll want to coordinate the synchronizing of data between all of your computers and peripheral networks or devices. The best solution I have found is a program called GoodSync, which will synchronize data between your desktop PC and laptop, home and office computers, computer and removable devices (USB Key, Flash Drive, CDRW disc), over a local network or the Internet. PC Magazine, Network World and other trusted sites give GoodSync their seal of approval and you can add my endorsement to that list.

GoodSync offers true bi-directional synchronization, which prevents the deletion of files and data loss. Like Mozy, GoodSync is by far the easiest and most intuitive syncing program I have discovered at any price. GoodSync offers effortless automatic synchronization, and this is another no-brainer. You can download and use GoodSync for free, but I would recommend that you upgrade to GoodSync Pro for $19 and use all of their amazing features and free updates.

Data Protection:

My antivirus program of choice is avast! Home Edition. I have been using this program for years and I have never had an incident. avast! is a full-featured antivirus package designed for home users and non-commercial use and the Home Edition is free of charge. I’m sure you are curious as to why such a robust program would be free. It is their opinion that it is possible to prevent global viruses from spreading by efficient prevention, and many users are not able to or do not want to pay for antivirus software. I think the marketing twist is that when you see how well this program performs, you’ll buy the commercial version for your business.

Resident protection (the real-time protection of the operating system), is one of the most important parts of an antivirus program. avast! features a powerful resident module that is able to detect a virus before it has any chance to infect your computer. You can expect 100% detection of In-the-Wild viruses (viruses already spreading between users) and excellent detection of Trojan horses.

Personal Security:

While we are talking about securing and backing up personal data, it is my opinion that the job is not complete until you have protected yourself. You have medical and life insurance, but odds are that you do not yet have ‘identity insurance’. Identity theft occurs to someone in America every few seconds and it is reaching epidemic proportions.

I remember the early days of the commercial Internet when rumors began to circulate about malicious programs that were being spread by file downloads. The early virus attacks were harmless by today’s standards and antivirus programs hadn’t yet been introduced. They were mostly rumors back then, but everyone seemed to know someone – who knew someone – who had been attacked by such a ‘virus’. It wasn’t long before such a thing developed into a global calamity and antivirus software became the first program you loaded onto a new computer.

I believe that is where we find ourselves today as it relates to Identity Theft. Although this is one of the fastest growing crimes, we are in the early stage of a global scourge. You’ve probably heard Paul Harvey or Sean Hannity talk on the radio about a company called LifeLock. LifeLock gets a lot of attention because their CEO Todd Davis publishes his Social Security number online. LifeLock is a proactive identity theft protection agency, specializing in prevention of identity theft rather than just the reporting of it. LifeLock, founded in 2005, is already considered the industry leader.

Such crimes are an unfortunate part of living in our modern world, but there is something you can do to protect yourself from even the craftiest identity thieves. This is by far the cheapest insurance you can buy to prevent identity theft from happening to you. LifeLock is the Identity Theft Prevention Solution backed by a one-million dollar guarantee! I probably will not publish my Social Security Number on the Internet, but I am a customer of LifeLock and the have peace of mind in knowing that I have closed the loop on my security concerns for the New Year and beyond.

DIY Security

When it comes to our personal data, losing it or having it stolen is a devastating, life altering experience. None of us question the need for medical insurance and life insurance, but few of us have identity or data insurance safeguarding us. This is no longer something you should put off as next year’s resolution. You can implement a strategy such as I outlined above for a few dollars per month, and you can DIY in a matter of hours.

When your data insurance is in place, I would be willing to bet you’ll have the most restful night’s sleep you can remember, and there will be no hangover in the morning regardless of how much data you did the night before. To learn more about the things I mentioned in this article and other time-saving data management tools for non-geeks; visit the website at www.DIY-Secure.com.



By: Tom Heatherington

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