DECEMBER 2010
Inside This Issue . . .
NO HOLIDAY FOR ID THIEVES UNWANTED CHRISTMAS GIFTS
NOT EASY BEING GREEN AVOID TWITTER TEMPTATIONS
PLEASE ROB ME THIS MONTH IN PROTECT
“Sleighbells ring, are you listening? On the ground, snow is glistening.” Yes, the Christmas season is here and identity thieves are expecting a big gift. Why? Because during the holidays, people of goodwill open their hearts and their wallets. This is a beautiful thing, but it also makes everyone acutely vulnerable to the schemes and scams of criminals who want to take advantage of the moment, to strike while our guard is down, to lure us into bad purchases, false charity, stolen documents, lost identities.
PROTECT can be part of the solution. PROTECT is a monthly newsletter to help you avoid becoming one of the 11 million Americans already victimized by identity theft. Each issue explains the latest crimes and scams and, most importantly, tell you how to protect yourself and loved ones. PROTECT is brought to you by the people who operate I.D. SHIELD 360, a leading service that helps shield you from the criminals determined to steal your most important possession – your identity.
CREDIT SCORE MYTHS
FOUR UNWANTED CHRISTMAS GIFTS
This edition of PROTECT includes a useful story — No Holiday For ID Thieves — of how to protect your identity home, at work and at the mall during the holiday season. But first, hereʼs a quick look at four very specific Christmas scams that are sweeping the country right now. GIFT CARD GRIFTERS
Gift cards are more popular than ever. Nearly every major retailer offers gift cards, many of which are displayed at checkout counters. Today, most cards are protected by scratch-off security codes and protective packaging. If the cards are unprotected, while on display, however, thieves have learned to copy the numbers and then call a toll-free number to find out when the cards have been activated. Once this is achieved, it is a simple process for them to get to the store and make purchases before the real cardholder gets there. The best advice for avoiding this rip-off is the buy cards only from retailers who protect the cards in safe places (like behind the register) and in protective wrappings.
E-CARD EXPOSURE Here is how this Christmas scam works. You receive an email from an unnamed friend or acquaintance who has sent you an e-card that can be viewed by clicking on a link. Clicking on that link can unleash anything from spyware and pop-up ads to viruses. In some cases, nothing bad happens until you download software from the e-card website that is said to be necessary to read the card. The key to safety is to delete any e-cards where authenticity is in doubt. Or, at minimum, do not click on links within the questionable e-card. This scam provides yet another good reason for installing antivirus and anti-spyware software.
CHARITY SCAMS Charitable donations rise during the holiday season as people remember those less fortunate than themselves. Phony representatives of real or fake charities are adept at making emotionallycharged appeals at this time of year. These may come in personal appeals, or via telemarketing, direct mail or email. In any case, be careful: do your homework, request identification and accreditations, confirm that the organization is real, and ask reasonable questions about how the money will be spent. High pressure sales pitches are especially dubious. Do not give cash, never supply credit card information by email or phone, and never write checks to individual solicitors. POP UP STORES Beware of this seasonʼs trendy toy and “must have it” gift. Scammers are set to take advantage of the hysteria by setting up online stores and auctions that purport to be well stocked with the scarce “it” items of the moment. After taking your orders and your money, these fly-by-night merchants will then shut down and disappear. At best, you have been disappointed and lost your purchase price. At worst, they now have your credit card number and other sensitive personal data. To avoid this mistake, shop reputable merchants and stick to websites of which you are familiar. Also, remember to use a credit card, rather than a debit card which is linked to your bank account.
NOT EASY BEING GREEN
The Federal Trade Commission is making news by releasing a tough new set of guidelines to regulate the advertising of eco-friendly products. While the proposed regulations are being debated, itʼs a good time to look at some common green advertising claims that are false or misleading. Such environmental claims are known in the advertising business as the “Seven Sins of Greenwashing,” so named by the respected environmental advocacy group Terrachoice. 1. Sin of Hidden Tradeoffs. A claim suggesting that a product is “green” based on a narrow set of attributes without attention to other important environmental issues. Paper, for example, is not necessarily eco-friendly just because it comes from a well-managed forest. It also matters how it is made and shipped. 2. Sin of No Proof. A claim that cannot be substantiated by easily accessible supporting information or by a reliable third-party certification.
3. Sin of Vagueness. A claim so poorly defined or broad that its real meaning is likely to be misunderstood by the consumer. “All-natural” is an example; lots of poisons are naturally occurring. Natural and green are not necessarily the same thing.
4. Sin of Worshipping False Labels. A product that, through either words or images, has a fake label or seal, or gives the impression of third-party endorsement where no endorsement exists. 5. Sin of Irrelevance. A claim that may be truthful but is unimportant or unhelpful for consumers seeking environmentally preferable products. “CFCfree” is a common example; CFCs are already banned by law.
6. Sin of Lesser of Two Evils. A claim that may be true within its product category, but distracts the consumer from the negative impact of the category as a whole. Organic cigarettes or fuel-efficient SUVs are good examples.
7. Sin of Fibbing. The environmental claims that are just plain false. A nice way to say “liar.” Enough said about this sin.
A GAME FROM TERRACHOICE THAT HELPS CONSUMERS RECOGNIZE THE SEVEN SINS
NO HOLIDAY FOR
IDENTITY THIEVES
During the winter holiday season, more than any other time, you are vulnerable to identity theft. You始re doing more shopping, you始re in a hurry, the crowds are bigger, offers and sales are flying fast and furious, cash and credit cards are out and about, festive decorations distract, and the good feelings of the season lead you to let down your guard. Sad but true. Here are some tips to protect yourself online, at the store and at home.
SHOPPING ONLINE
KNOW THE SELLER. Use online merchants who are members of wellknown certification programs such as Verisign or the Better Business Bureau.
PAYMENT OPTIONS. Pay with credit card instead of cash or wiring money. You can delay payment and seek a credit from the card issuer if the products or services are not delivered. PASSWORD PRIVACY. Create complex passwords. Do not use a password that gives personal information about you, such as birthdate, and do not use the same password for multiple sites.
PAPER TRAIL. Print and save copies of all transactions so that you can match them up to accounts and bills later on.
SECURE SITES. Use secure sites only. Look for the key or padlock at the bottom of your web browser, and when you, pay look for the URL to change from http to shttp or https. SAFE SOFTWARE. Install reliable virus protection and anti-spyware software on your PC. Do not fall for scamware or false claims that your site has a virus and that you must respond.
SECURE COMPUTERS. When youʼre away from home, do not save private information onto computers used by the public. In public places, log out completely and do not save login information.
DONʼT GO PHISHING. Do not respond to emails or instant messages that ask you to provide account information or your personal data for verification, and donʼt follow links to websites in such emails either. FACEBOOK FOLLIES. Social media sites are increasingly used by retailers to promote sales. But they are also increasingly used by scammers and people masquerading as friends. Go directly to the retailer site to take advantage of a deal.
AT THE STORE
CLEAN YOUR WALLET. Make your wallet clean and lean. Take only the basics such as credit card, checks or cash you need for the day. Never carry your Social Security card around with you.
PURSE POLICY. If you must take a purse or pocketbook, use one that zips and hangs in front of you.
BE VIGILANT. Malls and stores are crowded. Be aware of other shoppers standing nearby; they may be copying your credit card information or taking cellphone pictures. Or they may be traditional purse snatchers and pickpockets.
ATM ACTION. Avoid ATMʼs that are not bank branded; others are easy to run a scam on. Use ATMs that are in
bright light or have a security guard. Beware of skimmers; these are unauthorized gadgets that can capture and store your information. COLD SHOULDER. When you use a card in a store, watch out for shoulder surfers, people looking over your shoulder when you enter your PIN. Donʼt be afraid to tell them to back off.
CARS AND VALUABLES. Do not leave valuables in your car. Glove compartments are often the scene of a crime. If you must, place pocketbooks and other items in the trunk; it is a little harder to access. RETAIN RECEIPTS. Keep all receipts and, when you have matched them to bank and credit card statements, shred them rather than putting them in the trash.
HOME SWEET HOME
HOME SAFETY. The holidays bring more people into your home. Fun, but it makes it easier to have a checkbook, financial statement, wallet or cellphone stolen. A fireproof wall safe is a good investment.
POSTAL PROTECTION. Mail envelopes containing checks or other sensitive information inside the Post Office. Watch out for bills or other mail that comes on a regular basis; failure to receive these could suggest mail theft. GIVE CHARITY WITH CARE. We all want to support good causes. But be sure that telephone or door-to-door solicitations are l egitimate. Insist on the personʼs identification and documentation.
MONITOR STATEMENTS. Most holiday identity theft can be caught relatively quickly by monitoring checking, debit and credit card accounts, and other financial statements. THE GIFT THAT KEEPS GIVING. Give yourself and your loved ones the gift of an identity protection system that can monitor key online accounts, furnish updated credit reports, and even provide insurance for any losses.
AVOIDING THE
TWITTER TEMPTATIONS Twitter is growing exponentially, with estimates of membership now between 40 and 50 million. Not surprisingly, scammers go where the people are, and there are a number of popular Twitter scams making their way through the system.
Perhaps the most frequent is Twitter phishing, which has many tactics but one overarching strategy: getting you to click on a link that takes you to a Twitter sign-in page where you give over your password or other information. Anyone following the link will be directed to a fake logon page or other similar data gathering page. With enough data, any scammer can fill in the rest.
There have been many instances of scammers inviting tweeps to follow a link with a phrase such as “Who posted that pic of you on Twitter!” Another invites followers to make up funny user names that incorporate various common security questions. Yet another promises that “you just won a free cellphone,” leading you to a link asking for your cell number and basic details. And one more: you tweet that you like a product, someone offers it to you at a special discounted price if you email him your credit card information or bank account number. HERE ARE SEVERAL EXPERT TIPS FOR AVOIDING TWITTER TEMPTATIONS:
1. Check the address. Before entering your Twitter password on any sign-on page, check that the address bar shows http://twitter.com/. Beware of anything that uses another word on either side of "twitter."
2. Trust but verify. Be wary about clicking on links, even ones that appear to come from people you know. 3. Protect your password. Change your password frequently, and immediately if you think your account may have been compromised.
4. Keep it to yourself. Never give away confidential information about yourself in a tweet, even if it seems perfectly innocent. 5. Don't be a follower. Don't automatically follow people who follow you. Visit their profile page and see if they look real. 6. Update your security software.
7. Check out the message services. Make sure they are legitimate; popular honest ones are TweetDeck and Twhirl.
8. Get real. Do not believe any message that says you won something, or promise riches working from home, or services that claim they'll get you more followers.
WEBSITE SAYS PLEASE ROB ME
definitely not . . . home . . . The goal of this website is to raise some awareness on this issue and have people think about how they use services like Foursquare, Brightkite, Google Buzz etc. Because all this site is, is a dressed up Twitter search page. Everybody can get this information. “
At first it seems like a joke. But PleaseRobMe, the website, is deadly serious. For those of you who are going out or away, and cannot wait to share the news with the immediate world, it is a wake up call.
Launched by the new concept and idea factory Forthehack, the site is ingenious yet simple: it repeats updates on Twitter, Foursquare and other site of people who are telling the world where they are and, concomitantly, that they are not home. (Iʼm at such-and-such bar for the evening or I am on vacation in the Bahamas.) The point is to raise awareness of the risks of posting these kinds of updates especially in light of the increasingly location-based applications found on the internet. The organizersʼ own words say it best: “The danger is publicly telling people where you are. This is because it leaves one place you're
To drive the point home, PleaseRobMeʼs homepage shows a graphic of a scruffylooking burglar. Below that, it indicates that the site is “listing all those empty homes out there.” The front page is a scrolling list of every•one who has just “left home” and there are dozens of new entries hit every minute. You can filter through the endless results by city or username.
“Our intention is not, and never has been, to have people burglarized,” declare the developers. “Don't get us wrong, we love the whole location-aware thing. The information is very interesting and can be used to create some pretty awesome applications. However, the way in which people are stimulated to participate in sharing this information, is less awesome.” The site has drawn some criticism for privacy concerns, but mostly it is incredibly popular. Forthehack is seeking to affiliate with a foundation or organization to help spread the message about the risks of irresponsible use of social media. CLICK HERE TO SEE WHAT ALL THE EXCITEMENT IS ABOUT
TRUE STORIES HOME SWEET HOME A 41-year-old Sheboygan WI woman, Yvonne H. Johnson, has been charged with five counts of identity theft for allegedly renting an apartment and setting up utilities using the identity of a woman her daughter had robbed several years earlier. The victim, then a 17-year old girl, had been robbed of her Social Security card and other identifying information. Police discovered that Johnson had used the victim始s identity to rent an apartment, and also her name and Social Security number to sign up for electricity, water, and Direct TV. Johnson had accumulated bills totaling $3,966 under the victim's name at the time of her arrest. SENIOR STORY A Vancouver WA woman, accused of stealing thousands of dollars from an elderly man, has pleaded guilty to forgery and identity theft. Becky Lynn Iverson was arrested for stealing $300,000 from a 90-year-old man for whom she ran errands. Prosecutors say she forged checks on the man始s account and withdrew money over the period of a year-and-a-half. Iverson worked at a real estate firm and befriended the man when he and his 94year-old wife sold their home in 2007. The case surfaced when a bank teller grew suspicious and alerted a supervisor, who called the police. AT LEAST HE BUYS AMERICAN A Rochester NY man has been arrested with his wife for stealing the identity of a woman who had suffered a traumatic brain injury. Authorities allege that Kenneth Vickers and his wife, Wynette ReedVickers, pilfered the personal information from a disabled woman who lived at a group home where the couple worked. The couple then opened credit card accounts in the woman始s name and ran up debts of $185,000. Among the purchases was a Ford Expedition.
CUSTOMER SERVICE
The FBI and Wells Fargo bank are offering a reward to help track down a former bank manager accused of taking up to $1.2 million from customers. The FBI says Shawn Leimomi Saia worked for the bank for nearly four years, up to late summer 2010. She was discovered to have opened new bank accounts for customers without their knowledge, to get the commissions and access to their funds. There is a warrant out for identity theft, credit card fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud and money laundering. Investigators have asked for the public始s assistance in locating her.
DOCTORED DEATH CERTIFICATE A North Carolina woman, who forged the death certificate of a nursing home patient in order to avoid a court appearance, has been sentenced to 45 months in federal prison. Karen Marie Woods, a registered nurse, doctored the death certificate of deceased patient Suzie Baker to make it appear that Woods herself had died. This took place three days before Woods was scheduled to appear in court on a prescription drug diversion charge. The police became suspicious of the timing as well as a request for immediate cremation of the body. To make matters worse, it turned out that Woods had lost her nursing license, and had gained employment in the nursing home in the first place by using a stolen identity. BIG THEFT, SMALL COMPENSATION Under a proposed new court settlement, millions of current and former TD Ameritrade customers whose contact information was stolen more than three years ago will be eligible to receive as much as $2,500. But it's
not clear that many of the 6.2 million customers affected actually will be able to collect anything under the proposed settlement. The payments can be as little as $50. The new proposed settlement is the second attempt at resolving the lawsuit. The first settlement offered customers only anti-spam software and a promise of tighter security at TD Ameritrade.
GOOD AT COMPUTERS Authorities are looking for an Alabama man charged with identity theft after investigators say he stole sensitive employee information from the computers of the company for which he worked. Tedo Meyon Moody Jackson worked for a milling company where he told company officials he was “good at working on computers” and was asked to help fix a computer. Jackson used the personal information to obtain credit cards, and other products and services. At one point, he even tried to get a mortgage for a new home using his co-workerʼs financial information.
LOANS CAME DUE
A Honolulu HI judge has sentenced a California man to 10 years in prison for his role in a identity theft scam. Willie Briggs received thousands of dollars in loans from Oahu Citi-Financial branches by using other peoplesʼ Social Security numbers and fake ID cards. His girlfriend Audrey Collins is awaiting sentencing on the same charges. Briggs bought the Social Security numbers online.
MYTHS ABOUT YOUR
PROTECT is publishing a series on understanding your credit report for a simple reason: knowing what is in these reports is vital to your economic health and safety. You need a clean report to apply for a mortgage on a house, to buy a car, or to finance any big ticket item. In the first four installments, we looked at what is in the report, how your credit score is calculated, how to improve your credit score, and how to fix mistakes.
Today, the focus is on the myths and legends that have grown up around the credit score. These are usually the result of misinformation and bad advice. Here are some mythbusting facts: MYTH 1
You only have one credit score. The three major credit bureaus use the same basic information, but may have differences in the way they use or calculate some of the information. You need to check all three on a regular basis.
MYTH 2
Age, income, race and gender count. Nonsense. None of this information has any bearing on your score. The score measures your payment of credit cards and other debts.
MYTH 3
A higher salary will boost your score. Earning more money, winning the lottery or inheriting a fortune, does not matter. See answer to Myth 2.
MYTH 4
Checking your own credit lowers your score. No. You can check your own score as many times as you want through the three bureaus without effecting your score.
MYTH 5
Shopping for a loan hurts your score. When you apply for a loan or get preapproved the creditor checks your credit report, which shows up as an inquiry to your credit. As long as the same kind of inquiries, e.g., car loan or mortgage, are made within 14 days of each other, they count as one inquiry.
MYTH 7
Credit card offers damage your score. Credit card solicitations don't affect your score. And if you take up the offers, there is no magic number for how many credit cards are too many. But it helps to keep the ratio of credit used to credit available at a low level.
MYTH 8
MYTH 6
When you get married the credit scores are married, too. Wrong. Accounts opened singly are still judged separately. When you open accounts though, that information will be reflected on each of your credit reports, for better or for worse. Same with divorce; nothing happens automatically so you must sever the accounts one-by-one. Credit scores are locked in for six months. No, again. It is a dynamic process and your FICO score changes as soon as data on your credit card changes.
CNBC LOOKS AT THE TOP 3 CREDIT MYTHS