Identity Theft
January 29, 2007
Every minute, in the United States, 19 more people become the victims of identity theft. That means that every year about 10 million people have their identity stolen.[i] Identity theft is the number one concern of all consumer who contact the Federal Trade Commission. According the U.S. Department of Justice Statistics, identity theft is now passing drug trafficking as the number one crime in the nation.[ii] Clearly identity theft is a major concern of American consumers, and their concern is not unfounded. In fact, 49% of consumers feel that they do not know how to adequately protect themselves from this crime.[iii]
What exactly is identity theft? Identity theft can be described as using someone else’s personal information such as social security numbers, names, address, or user names and passwords to establish or change financial accounts, or to conceal their own identity for criminal activities.
The main reason a thief seeks to steal a persons identity is for financial fraud. This is usually accomplished by a thief establishing a bank or credit card account under the victims name, running up purchases to the credit limit, and then leaving the bill unpaid. The bank or credit institution then seeks payment from the unknowing victim, whose identity was used to start a fraudulent account. According to the Identity Theft Resource Center, a victim spends an average of over 600 hours and $1,400.00 of out of pocket expenses in an effort to restore their credit.[iv]
The second reason why a thief may steal one’s identity is to take on the victim’s identity to commit a crime, cross a country’s border, get special permits, or to hide one’s own identity from authorities. These include activities like, computer and cyber crimes, organized crime, drug trafficking, alien smuggling, money laundering and even terrorism. A related reason why identity theft has become so common and is on the rise is because only one out of every 700 criminals will be caught and prosecuted for their crime.[v]
Several methods are employed by criminals in identity theft. It may be from a gas station or restraint receipt that you accidentally forgot or threw away without destroying it. Although less common now than a few years ago some companies still print your full credit card number and name on the receipt. With that information a criminal can easily place an order over the phone or online. Even websites that seek to make transactions secure by asking for the card holder’s address or phone number, can easily be bypassed if the criminal simply looks up the victim’s address and phone number in the phone book or through and online directory. Your credit card can be "skimmed", meaning a device is placed on the outside of the legitimate card reader to copy your personal information as you use your card in an ATM or gas station pump. Personal information can also be memorized or copied by waiters or sales clerks, taken directly from your mailbox, and they could even be taken from the files and records of your employer, landlord, hospital, or financial lender.
One of the more common methods as of late is to con you into giving the criminal your person information yourself. This can be through spoof emails – emails which appear to be from a legitimate company or service, and are often built on the premise of possible errors with your account, which requires one to log onto a carbon copy of the site with which you are familiar – or through fishing sites which unknowingly redirect you to a “carbon copy” re-login page, causing you to think you simply need to re-login to your financial lender’s website. In reality you have just give the thief all the information he could possibly want by looking at the information registered with that institution. Yet another way a thief may use your computer to steal your personal information is to exploit security holes in any software that you may have on your computer. The thief may install software that logs every keystroke that you make or looks through the files stored on your computer for any useful information. While these may seem like high-tech hacking tactics in reality they are very easily learned skills that can be found abundantly on the internet and use free downloadable programs. Any tech-savy teen with a little time on their hands is more than capable of using the aforementioned methods.
Some thieves even take the trash of likely targets, which they then sift through look for discarded pre-approved credit cards or any other information that they may use to piece together the victim’s personal information.
Laws like the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003 and The Fair Credit Reporting Act were enacted to help protect consumer’s identities. However, the ultimate responsibility (and also the most effective defense) lie with the owner of the identity, you. The Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act requires a national system of fraud detection and alerts, and also holds credit agencies responsible to identify patterns of fraud. The Fair Credit Reporting Act requires each of the nationwide consumer reporting companies such as, Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion, to provide an individual with a free copy of their credit report, at their request, once every 12 months or if they believe they have been the victim of fraud. This report can be obtained from http://www.annualcreditreport.com.
To prevent this epidemic problem from happening to you, you must take a proactive approach. Simply telling yourself that it won’t happen to you will not work. Each individual must take the necessary steps to protect their own sensitive personal information. These steps include:
- Monitoring your back and credit card statements and checking your credit report periodically for unauthorized accounts.
- Never give out your Social Security number unless you absolutely have to.
- Do not put anything but the required name and address on your checks and keep an eye on your checkbook while it is laying out and while you are writing a check. Someone can easily write down or memorize your address and account number in the time it takes to write a check. Also guard your deposit slips. Not only do they often have your name, address and account number printed on them, but they can also be used to withdraw money from your account. A thief must simply write a bad check, deposit it into your account and use the “less cash received” line to withdraw your money.
- Don’t carry your Social Security card or passport in your wallet or purse, and some experts suggest that you photocopy everything that you do carry in your wallet or purse to make recovery and canceling easier.
- Never give out personal information over the phone if you did not initiate the call and remember that a financial company will never ask you to email them your account information. If you do need to log in to their services, in response to an email, do not click the links in the email but rather type the address into your web browsers address bar.
- You should have your name and address removed from mailing lists by going to the Mail Preference Service (https://www.dmaconsumers.org/cgi/offmailing) and also remove your name from “pre-approved” credit offers by going to https://www.optoutprescreen.com.
- Be sure to shred – not just tear in half, but shred by cross cut – any credit offers or mail with personal information that you do receive before throwing it away.
- If you are ever denied credit, find out why. By law if you are denied credit the company must send you a credit report containing why you were denied.
- React quickly if you suspect that your identity has been stolen, or you see charges on your financial statements that you did not make.
In regard to computer related security there are several easy thing that you can do to protect yourself online.
- One of the simplest things you can do to protect your personal information is to use a secure password (one that is 8-13 characters long and includes a combination of uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers and symbols) and change that password every 60 days or so.
- Be sure your computer software, especially web browsers, are up-to-date by going to http://update.microsoft.com/ or the equivalent website for your software vendor.
- Look for digital security certificates, like VeriSign, when entering sensitive information.
- Never give out personal information unless you know who you are dealing with.
By taking a few simple steps to ensure your personal information is protect, you can save your self a great deal of time, effort and money by preventing identity theft from ever happening to you in the first place. As out lives become more and more involved with online registrations, website purchasing, and the ease with which digital data may be transferred or intercepted, it is more and more important to ensure that each individual is doing everything possible to protect their family, their money and their property by being aware of current security precautions.
[ii] http://www.baylor.edu; March 29, 2006, Jonathan Lopez
[iv] Ciampa, Mark. 2005. Security + Guide to Network Security Fundamentals. Thomson Course Technology, Canada.
[v] Ibid.
Guess The Number
January 27, 2007
In this bit of code I had to create a secret random number using the JavaScript Math.floor(Math.random() * 100) + 1 and then prompt the visitor for a guess along with an indication of whether the guess was too high or too low. I also had to keep track of the number of guesses and display that number along with a congratulation message.
Here is an example of this script in action.
Here is the JavaScript code that I used:
<!–
var randomNumber = Math.floor(Math.random() * 100) +1; //Produces a random number between 1 and 100
var numberOfGuesses = 1;
randomNumber = parseInt(randomNumber);
document.write(“<h3>This page has produced a secret random number between 1 and 100. Please try to guess the number in the pop-up dialogue box.<br />Enter \”0\” at any time if you want to quit.</h3>”);
stop: {
var guessedNumber = window.prompt(“Please enter an integer between 1 and 100:”, “1″);
guessedNumber = parseInt(guessedNumber);
if (guessedNumber == randomNumber) {
document.write(“<br /><h1>Amazing! The number was ” + randomNumber + ” and it only took you 1 try!</h1>”); }
else if (guessedNumber == 0){
document.write(“<br /><h3>You have chosen to quit the script. Refresh the page to run it again.</h3>”);
break stop; }
else {
while (guessedNumber != randomNumber){
if (guessedNumber == 0){
document.write(“<br /><h3>You have chosen to quit the script. Refresh the page to run it again.</h3>”);
break stop; }
else if (guessedNumber < 1){
guessedNumber = window.prompt(“Sorry, but you must enter a number between 1 and 100. Please try again:”, “1″);
guessedNumber = parseInt(guessedNumber);}
else if (guessedNumber > 100){
guessedNumber = window.prompt(“Sorry, but you must enter a number between 1 and 100. Please try again:”, “1″);
guessedNumber = parseInt(guessedNumber);}
else if (guessedNumber > randomNumber) {
guessedNumber = window.prompt(“Your guess was too high. Please try again:”, “1″);
guessedNumber = parseInt(guessedNumber); }
else if (guessedNumber < randomNumber) {
guessedNumber = window.prompt(“Your guess was too low. Please try again:”, “1″);
guessedNumber = parseInt(guessedNumber); }
else {
guessedNumber = window.prompt(“Sorry, but you must enter a number between 1 and 100. Please try again:”, “1″); }
numberOfGuesses = numberOfGuesses + 1;
}
document.write(“<br /><h1>Correct! The number was ” + randomNumber + “! It took you ” + numberOfGuesses + ” tries.</h1>”); }
document.write(“<br /><br />Please refresh this page to run this script again.”);
}
// –>
</script>
