How Crooks Get Information

1. Phishing: Crooks send you an email pretending to be from your bank, PayPal, eBay, Amazon etc. If you click, you are sent to a phony website that mimics the real one. You are then prompted to divulge information including passwords and credit card numbers.
2. On-line stores: When you give your credit card information to an Internet vendor, they may put additional charges on it without authorisation, use it fraudulently at other merchants or sell it.
3. In ordinary retail outlets and restaurants. Clerks write down the number.
4. Spyware : toy programs that snoop on your computer and send any bank accounts etc. they find to the crooks.
5. ActiveX : The Internet Explorer browser is dangerous to use because it allows websites to surreptitiously run software on your computer, and to install spyware. Ditto for Outlook.
6. Windows: the security in Windows in made of Swiss cheese, tacked on as an afterthought.
7. From cracking the websites of vendors and stealing their databases.
8. Digging through your garbage to look for bills, bank statements, id cards, credit cards etc.
9. Stealing your mail.

Protecting Yourself

1. Credit cards are hopeless from a security point of view. Throw them away and use debit cards instead which at least require a PIN number. In these days of high tech criminals, it is folly to use anything less than smart cards which use digital signatures. There are common in Europe, but just being introduced into North America.
2. To project yourself from fraudulent Internet merchants, don’t give out your credit card number on-line, ever (by phone either). Use PayPal or a similar system like moneybookers. You then divulge nothing but your email address and possibly shipping address to the vendor.
3. To protect yourself from phishing, be extremely careful clicking a link in an email. Check the browser address bar to be sure you are going to the precise website claimed. It is safer to navigate to the website independently in the browser.
4. Don’t use IE or Outlook. Turn off ActiveX and JavaScript except at trustworthy government sites. Java however is safe.
5. Protect yourself from spyware by installing only necessary software and software from known reputable companies. Run a virus/spyware checker weekly.
6. To protect yourself from the incompetent Windows security system, make sure you check for and apply any security updates each night. Consider using a more secure OS, e.g. MacOS or Linux, especially if you have important financial records on your computer.
7. Check your credit rating every three months to make sure there is no suspicious activity. In the USA you can check with annualcreditreport.com.
8. If you suspect your identity has been stolen, report the problem to the police immediately. The longer you wait, the longer it will take to repair the damage, and the bigger the damage.
9. In the USA, go to ftc.gov to file reports and learn all the things you have to do if you suspect your identity has been stolen.
10. Shred any id cards, credit cards, bank statements, bills, library cards, anything that could be of use in establishing a fake id as you before discarding them.
11. Replace your external mailbox with a mail slot.