When protected, sensitive or confidential data is accessed or used by someone without authority, this is a data breach. This can involve any kind of data such as personal health, financial, or business related.

Not all data breaches result from hacking into a computer. One can breach data simply by peering over someone’s shoulder at the computer screen when they shouldn’t be. It can also be elaborately planned: A company’s new employee may actually be working for an extensive crime ring to steal data from the inside. Needless to say, a data breach can lead to identity theft (among many other problems).

In the workplace, especially retail, where credit cards are processed, the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard is designed to provide retailers with guidelines to eliminate data breaches. In a healthcare workplace, HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) helps control who has access to personal health information.

How can you protect yourself?

• As a consumer you must keep your operating system updated to the latest secure version.
• Run antivirus, antispyware, antiphishing and a firewall.
• Protect your wireless communications with encryption and use a VPN for portable devices.
• Use secure passwords with upper/lower case and numbers.
• In the event someone else is responsible for a breach read very carefully any notification of a data security breach and don’t assume that the breach was accidental or that identify theft is not likely.
• Use an identity theft protection product. It will scavenge cyberspace for any unauthorized use of personal information such as from your credit cards and Social Security number; will keep track of personal credit information; and will send an alert if suspicious activity is detected—maybe even prior to you receiving a consumer notification.

Robert Siciliano is an identity theft expert to BestIDTheftCompanys.com discussing  identity theft prevention. For Roberts FREE ebook text- SECURE Your@emailaddress -to 411247.

The vacant 5,000 square foot house next door to this kicking victim was on sale, and he had agreed with the realtor to keep an eye on it. Some kids got wind of this vacancy and put out a Facebook invitation to a Halloween rave party there.

He called 9-1-1 and the police broke up the party. However, kids kept arriving because the Facebook notice was still up. A mob of perhaps 60 kids was brewing at the end of the street.

The victim-to-be began chatting with the realtor’s partner—in front of the rave house. The realtor then approached a kid and was assaulted. Our victim intervened without much thought, got blindsided by one thug, then kicked by several kids to the ground.

Hindsight is 20/20

The victim, only after the beating, realized that he should have:

• Fled to his house and called the police.
• Remained outside and called the police (not as safe as above, but a lot better than jumping into a fight)

However, these weren’t the best options. The best option would have been this victim calling the police to come back when the mob was forming.

• The victim could have taken pictures of these kids (with his Nokia 1020) before any of the rumbling began.

Conclusion

1. Avoid mobs at all costs.
2. If someone is attacked, call the police and take pictures.
3. Do not jump in to break up a fight. Three scrawny but very angry punks can take down a much bigger well-meaning solitary person.
4. If you do get attacked, go ballistic—and target the gang’s leader.
5. Sprint to safety first chance you get.
6. Warn your kids about the dangers of raves.
7. Check out the “crime radar” of your neighborhood with this new tool.

Robert Siciliano personal and home security specialist to BestHomeSecurityCompanys.com discussing burglar proofing your home on Fox Boston. 

This year, one of the biggest identity theft rings originating from Minnesota was prosecuted—spanning 14 states and involving hundreds of victims. Total theft exceeded $2.5 million, and major retailers and banks were victimized.

Just who was part of this ring is mind boggling; the participants included a receptionist with the state Board of Psychology; and employees at the St. Paul Postal Credit Union, Wells Fargo Bank and other major companies. Insiders generally have direct access to client data and can do the most damage.

Victims of identity theft aren’t necessarily gullible and naïve. As just mentioned, one of the ring participants was the receptionist. She gave Social Security numbers of psychologists to the ring leaders.

One of those psychologists found out her identity had been stolen when a bank called her to report that a woman claiming to be her had attempted to get $4,000 cash back from a $6,800 check she tried to deposit. At another bank, the imposter tried again with a fake driver’s license in the victim’s name that had a photo of the imposter.

The imposter eventually confessed to cashing fraudulent checks and using fake checks and driver’s licenses with names of actual people. Her fraudulent purchases exceeded $154,500.

Basic Methods

• Other participants purchased high-end products with fake checks printed from special equipment, then returned them for cash refunds or gift cards.
• They also printed fake IDs and recruited about 10 people to enlist over 100 more to do the check cashing and product purchasing.
• A ringleader would often sit in a car while their help cashed a fake check, then the proceeds would be split.
• Thieves obtained personal information by breaking into homes, mailboxes, cars and businesses.
• The scam even sucked in family and friends. One ringleader had his two sons in on it.

This goes to show you how susceptible the public is to a mastermind of an extensive identity theft ring. Makes you think you can’t even trust the receptionist of the company you work for.

All that being said, account takeover generally can’t be prevented when organized criminals get a hold of account numbers. However new account fraud, when thieves use your Social Security number, can mostly can be prevented with identity theft protection.

Robert Siciliano is an identity theft expert to BestIDTheftCompanys.com discussing  identity theft prevention. For Roberts FREE ebook text- SECURE Your@emailaddress -to 411247.

JP Morgan are looking to hire for several positions within the Global Strategy and Infrastructure Compliance team.

Most of us may have heard the term, and know it’s related to security in some way, but do you really know what a firewall is? Traditionally, firewalls were built to keep danger at bay—they were doors (or walls) to block fire from coming into another area—hence the name firewall. When you’re thinking in terms of your online security, modern-day hardware and software firewalls are similar. They act as barriers to prevent unauthorized access to your personal information.

Firewalls are software programs or hardware devices that filter the information coming through your Internet connection to your computer (and all the devices that are connected to that connection). A firewall protects you and your devices by examining each piece of information that flows between your devices and the Internet.

Hardware firewalls, such as those included with some routers, are usually a good first line of defense against outside attacks, and they require little to no configuration. The one down sides of using only a hardware firewall is that it only protects you if you are at home. So if you take your computer to a cafe or on a trip, your device is no longer protected by the home-based firewall.

Fortunately, software firewalls can catch these kinds of threats because they are running on your computer and can take a closer look at the network traffic. This allows them to intercept a malicious program before it leaves your computer.

Now that you know the purpose of firewalls, follow these tips for greater security online:

• Make sure you are using a router that includes a firewall as a first layer of protection
• Use comprehensive security, like McAfee LiveSafe™ service, that includes a two-way firewall that filters both incoming and outgoing traffic, as well as protection for all your devices, your identity and your data
• Turn off file-sharing and printer-sharing features if you don’t need them
• Use common sense, don’t click on links or open attachments from people you don’t know—you could unknowingly be giving them access to your device
• While the bad guys may always be looking to do harm, just remember that we all need to be vigilant about protecting ourselves and our devices, which in turn helps protect everyone else.

Robert Siciliano is an Online Security Expert to McAfee. He is the author of 99 Things You Wish You Knew Before Your Mobile was Hacked!

Shredding is fun! Repeat that 10 times and you just might start believing it. Certainly shredding is a tad bit of work, but that’s what kids and interns are for!

Shredding might be inconvenient, but it’s absolutely necessary—and it’s fundamental to protecting your identity and the identities of those who have entrusted you with their data. Shredding is like recycling, eating well and exercise: You may not always want to do it, but it’s good for you.

Here’s how to better manage your shredables:

1. Primary documents: I shred everything that comes in the mail with my name on it and that I don’t need. Shred or destroy prescription bottles, CDs with data on them, and supporting tax documents older than three years (some say seven), including investment statements, bank statements, canceled checks and paystubs.
2. Secondary documents: Documents like ATM receipts, credit card statements, utility bills and insurance policies should all be kept for two years. The only reason to keep these is in case you determine a mistake was made so you can go back and look. Otherwise, if you can access any of these documents online, shred them now. Homeowner-related documents should be kept as long as you own the home and maybe a year after you eventually sell it.
3. Devices: Don’t forget to shred or destroy hard drives, SD cards, mobile phones, SIM cards and thumb drives. While reformatting and reinstalling an operating system will get rid of most of the data, it’s just better to kill the drive with a special shredder for non-paper files—also known as a sledgehammer.
4. Reduce paper: One way to reduce all the stuff needing shredding is to turn off the paper. At this point, most, if not all, of your bank, credit card, utilities, mobile phone and other accounts allow (and in some cases, require) e-statements. This means every month you’ll get an email stating, “Your statement is ready!” But don’t click that link, as it could be a phish. Get access to your statements through a password manager or via your favorite menu.
5. Shred-a-thons: Many banks now sponsor shred-a-thons where one of those crankin’, big shredding trucks shows up to the bank’s parking lot and you can watch boxes and boxes of your stuff get decimated right in front of you. Bring the kids!
6. Burn it: Depending on the amount of stuff you have to shred and your local ordinances regarding conflagrations, you might want to box up all of your shredables and burn them the same time you might burn leaves, or when you have a backyard bonfire.

Robert Siciliano is an identity theft expert to BestIDTheftCompanys.com discussing  identity theft prevention. For Roberts FREE ebook text- SECURE Your@emailaddress -to 411247.

Ever wanted to be a hacker? Today, anyone can learn code and understand the ins and outs of all the technology we are simultaneously blessed and cursed with. But once you know how all this technology works to the point of calling yourself a hacker (which, by the way, isn’t necessarily a bad word), then everyone in your life will be calling you to fix their devices. Hackers are often technologists that are inventive, curious and take technology to the edge of its limits. They often break it so they can fix it.

Anyway, one of the more interesting hacking professions is the “penetration tester,” which is someone hired by companies to determine the vulnerabilities in a company’s networks and then patches those vulnerabilities so bad guys can’t get in. “Penntesters,” as they are known, are good-guy hackers also known as “white hats.” Their counterpart bad-guy hackers, known as “black hats,” are also penntesters—but they don’t do it to look for vulnerabilities to then secure the network; they do it to ultimately get in and steal stuff for their own personal gain.

One of the best ways to protect your own network is to hack your own network, as Lifehacker shows us here. “A new, free, open-source tool called Reaver exploits a security hole in wireless routers and can crack most routers’ current passwords with relative ease. Here’s how to crack a WPA or WPA2 password, step by step, with Reaver—and how to protect your network against Reaver attacks.”

What this hacker does is explain how the attack works, seeing the vulnerabilities users can use to reverse engineer this process to protect themselves.

Whether on your own network or on someone’s free wireless network, a VPN such as Hotspot Shield VPN  will mask a user’s IP address and protect all wireless data from thieves. But if a router is hacked, that vulnerability may still allow for an attacker to plant code on various devices. So check out the Lifehacker post and lock down your router with encryption.

Robert Siciliano is an Identity Theft Expert to Hotspot Shield VPN. He is the author of 99 Things You Wish You Knew Before Your Identity Was Stolen See him discussing internet and wireless security on Good Morning America. Disclosures. For Roberts FREE ebook text- SECURE Your@emailaddress -to 411247.