Identity Theft: A crime too personal
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By Chris Fernando, Journalist and Section Editor (IT)






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    How does it happen? As I said earlier, it’s not at all necessary for the criminal to be present near you to steal your personal information. In public places, for example, criminals may engage in shoulder surfing—watching you from a nearby location as you punch in your telephone calling card number or credit card number or listen in on your conversation if you give your credit-card number over the telephone to a hotel or rental car company. Shoulder surfing might also allow people to view your email message, in case you happen to be surfing the Net in a public place. Even the area near your home or office may not be secure. Some criminals might just go through your garbage cans or trash bin, to obtain copies of your checks, credit card or bank statements that you might have just "thrown" into the garbage can.



    Identity Theft crimes are on the rise


    Identity Theft crimes are on the riseJust one wrong mouse click, while you are hooked up to the Net, might also land you in trouble. The criminal might just spam you with unsolicited email that contains an attachment - perhaps Pamela Anderson's picture. You might just click over the attachment in excitement and then nothing happens on the screen. You delete the mail thinking that the file must have been corrupted. But little did you realize that the "picture" was actually a key logger or a Trojan in disguise. A key logger is a simple program that runs in the background, recording every keystroke of yours and then makes it accessible to the criminal, when you log onto the Internet. A Trojan on the other hand does more - it might just allow the criminal to take over your PC remotely, allowing the criminal to scan through your hard drives for personal information.

    Other ways might include false applications for loans and credit cards, fraudulent withdrawals from bank accounts, fraudulent use of telephone calling cards, or obtaining other goods or privileges - which the criminal might be denied if he were to use his real name.

    So how do you prevent your identity from being stolen? Watch this space for more soon…




    AUTHOR: Chris Fernando

    TAGS: Life                           

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