Identity Theft Online

“Millions of Consumers are Twisting in the Wind:” Sony Declines to Testify at Congressional Hearing ‎

Its a pretty big deal when Congress calls you up to testify at a hearing especially when its regarding something bad you did.   Most companies drop everything they are doing, increase their lobbyists monthly retainers, craft talking points and prepare for the PR assault that is coming.  Oh and hope that the members of Congress are gentle on them.  Or, well, if you are Sony Corporation, you can simply decline the invitation.

This is precisely what will happen when Sony does not show up for a House Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade hearing tomorrow about the threat of data breaches after hackers stole personal information from 77 million Sony PlayStation Network accounts.  Wait, so the hearing is actually about Sonyso this is essentially a party is being thrown and the guest of honor refuses to show up?  At least the folks at Sony were kind enough to provide answers written questions from the subcommittee on the data breach.

And, some members of Congress are a pretty miffed about Sony declining to testify. Ken J

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Tags: Congressional Hearing, Hearing

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Pros and cons of debt consolidation

When you meet financial problems caused by outstanding debt, you have many concerns to consider. One of them is your emotional discomfort because of you will need to worry about your creditors and their irritating calls and letters. Bad credit consolidation can help you resolve this problem as qualified debt relief specialists will combine all debts into one affordable payment.

Be prepared to disclose your financial information, as you can not qualify for debt settlement if you still have the ability to make full payment of your debt. In general, creditors simply offer credit consolidation for people who are really in deep financial problem and they could go for filing bankruptcy as a way out of debt if there is no replacement to solve it. So be prepared to disclose all relevant financial information such as your tax returns, statements of credit card, evidence of your assets and existing debts owed to other creditors.

Do the commitment amount installments that are offered to pay, as usually, creditors prefer that you make one payment to pay off your debt by offering a significant discount on the outstanding balance. Read more…

Tags: Bad credit consolidation

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Beauty Queen Guns Down Home Invader

An ex-con picked the wrong home to invade.

Imagine you’re in bed counting sheep dreaming of clouds and flying unicorns. Suddenly there is a knock on the door, which is startling to most people who wake up to the presence of noise and especially that of a knock at 3am.

In your discombobulated state you shuffle over to the door and open it to see who it is, they give you some song and dance and you open the door. Next, a hand wrapped over your face nose and mouth.

In my world this would never happen as previously described. In my world when the door is knocked on or the bell is rung a ferocious toothy German shepherd would lose her mind trying to get through the door, while I’m looking at my security cameras to see who is at the front door.  At the same time I’m accessing an intercom to begin dialog all the while ready to press a panic button on my home security alarm.

If the person at the door is in uniform I’m calling the police to determine if they are supposed to be there. If the p

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Tags: Home, Home Invader

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PODCAST: Greg Reber, CEO of AsTech Consulting, Discusses Data Breach Mitigation Strategies

It seems that major data breaches are happening on a daily basis these days.  Just recently we had the much covered Epsilon breach, as well as the recent attack on security provider Barracuda Networks – just to name a few.

Today we are speaking with Greg Reber, founder and CEO of AsTech Consulting. Si

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Tags: Breach, Data Breach

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Identity Theft vs Credit Card Fraud

While credit card fraud is a form of identity theft, not all identity theft is credit card fraud. It just so happens that identity theft involving credit cards is the type you are most likely to hear about on a regular basis. This type of theft usually occurs in one of two ways: the thief can physically steal a person’s credit card number and then use it to make transactions that do not require photo ID, whether it’s because the purchase is for a small amount, it’s somewhere like a gas pump where there is no clerk present or it is transacted by a clerk who just doesn’t follow procedure by asking to see identification.

The second way is through phishing scams, in which a thief sets up a bogus website and the consumer is fooled into typing in his or her credit card information. In this case, the person simply gets the credit card number and security code and the consumer’s contact information, but this is enough for even less experienced thieves to change the address on the account and likely open a new one in his or her name.

While the thief is not completely taking over the victim’s financial life. For example

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Tags: Card Fraud, Credit Card, Credit Card Fraud, Fraud

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