bankruptcy identity theft
Credit Repair Involving Identity Theft
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.
About the Author
Nicholas Boler is the owner of Repair Bad Credit Fast an informational website about Credit Repair. To view our many FREE articles or learn how to repair bad credit fast after bankruptcy, please visit us for Free Credit Repair Resources
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