This person is worried about credit-card fraud and identity theft. It's been a busy holiday shopping season, and those issues are in the news. The message seems to be:
- Check your credit-card accounts online, don't wait for the statement to arrive. Time is money in these scams.
- It's not enough to rip those junk-mail credit-card come-ons in two and toss 'em. Get a shredder ($20-$30) and shred 'em!
The threat of online fraud and identity theft may be scarier, but victims more often say it happened the old-fashioned way - their wallet, purse or mail was stolen, or their trash dumpster-dived.
Some stories today and this week:
Safeguarding your identity - McClatchy News Service
Many companies advocate rules on identity theft - LA Times - data companies losing consumers' personal data, what to do?
Feds charge man with identity theft - Seattle Times
Identity theft: Report it quickly - Indianapolis Star
The upside of credit card theft - Motley Fool
Fake 'Fresh Prince' back in jail - eonline
The Federal Trade Commission - logo: "Protecting America's Consumers" - contracted out a telephone survey of 4,057 adults in 2003 that resulted in this fascinating 93-page Identity Theft Report, which has been widely quoted.
Other resources:
FTC Dot Cons Jukebox - well-presented info on a wide array of modern frauds, scams, schemes and rip-offs.
FTC credit-card do's and don'ts
FTC Congressional testimony on identity theft and Social Security numbers - subcommittee discussion of FTC-sponsored telephone survey.
Good MSNBC story about this from early this year
Comments