« August 2006 | Archives Home | October 2006 »
Blog / September 2006
Personal data on 2,100 VCU students shows up on Google
Sep 1, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Someone at the school accidently put personal information including SSN in the wrong folder on a web server. Google slurped them up and the info was online for over 8 months! TimesDispatch.com reports: Human error caused the names, Social Security...
Government awards blanket purchase agreements to two credit bureaus
Sep 1, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Your tax dollars are primed and ready. The credit reporting agencies now are drooling, waiting for the next huge data breach anywhere within the government. When it happens—ka-ching. FCW has more. Three firms received blanket purchase agreements Aug. 14 to...
Laptop Stolen with Personal Data Of Chicago Employees
Sep 1, 2006 by Tom Fragala
A laptop was stolen from a City of Chicago contractor with sensitive personnel information. There is a simple way, using the Internet, to lock down the data on and track these laptops after they are stolen. This needs to be...
Call Center Staff in India Steal Confidential US and British Citizen's Data
Sep 2, 2006 by Tom Fragala
The Observer reports on a scandal that looks like it might really explode. Leading British and American companies face being dragged into an emerging fraud scandal at a call centre company in India.V-Angels, a Delhi-based outsourcing company that handles customer...
The Oregon DMV Gives Murderers Access to Your Data
Sep 3, 2006 by Tom Fragala
This one, I can hardly believe. Did you know that if you call the Oregon state DMV, the person you speak with there might be a convicted felon? And they would have access to your sensitive personal information (DMV data...
No-limit credit cards can damage your credit score
Sep 4, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Beware of no-limit credit cards. Despite the prestige and flexibility these cards offer, it’s possible the cards could result in a lower credit score. It seems odd, but someone who has the track record and wealth to qualify for such...
AARP Studies Security Breaches and Identity Theft
Sep 5, 2006 by Tom Fragala
The AARP released a staudy called Into the Breach: Security Breaches and Identity Theft. I don’t have time to analyze it in depth right now. However, I did note that 29% of breaches (1/1/05 – 5/26/06) were the result of...
Security breach at TSA exposes employee data
Sep 6, 2006 by Tom Fragala
The Transportation Security Administration suffers a data breach. No point in noting the irony. USAToday has the story. The Transportation Security Administration is warning 1,195 of its former employees that a contractor may have mailed their Social Security numbers and birth dates to...
Chase throws tapes in trash with Circuit City customer data
Sep 7, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Associated Press via MSN: Chase Card Services says it's notifying more than two and a-half (m) million Circuit City credit card holders that computer tapes containing their personal information were mistakenly thrown in the trash.The company says it thinks the...
Xanga.com Fined $1 Million for Disclosing Children's Data
Sep 7, 2006 by Tom Fragala
The FTC accounced this today: Social networking Web site operators Xanga.com, Inc. and its principals, Marc Ginsburg and John Hiler, will pay a $1 million civil penalty for allegedly violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and its implementing...
Some thoughts on the H-P board scandal
Sep 8, 2006 by Tom Fragala
I’ll assume you are aware of what is going on over in the Hewlett-Packard board room. I won’t opine on it directly. But I will add this. Pretexting is not identity theft. Pre-texting is a method, a means to gather...
FL National Guard laptop stolen
Sep 8, 2006 by Tom Fragala
A Florida National Guard laptop was stolen from a car. Florida Today reports: The Florida National Guard was conducting a security review Thursday after a laptop computer assigned to one of its soldiers was stolen in a car burglary.No classified...
BMO Bank of Montreal laptop stolen from branch
Sep 8, 2006 by Tom Fragala
This laptop was stolen from from the branch itself. Let me guess, it wasn’t locked down. So a $20 lock would have prevented this. Someone in security or IT should be fired. ottawasun.com has more: Hundreds of banking customers have been told...
What is pretexting? How is it related to identity theft?
Sep 8, 2006 by Tom Fragala
I wrote a post about this in April of 2004 on my first identity theft blog, scamsafe.com. You can find the pretext article here....
Virtual World Second Life Suffers Data Breach via Hackers
Sep 9, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Second Life is an online 3-D virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents via the Internet. Linden Labs issued this Second Life Security Bulletin: Linden Lab reported today that it is notifying its community of a database breach, which...
Stolen Computer at Univ. of Minnesota Puts Thousands of Students at Risk
Sep 9, 2006 by Tom Fragala
A story in the St. Paul Pioneer Press. A pair of computers containing the personal information — in some cases Social Security numbers — of thousands of University of Minnesota students was stolen from a campus office. Now officials are...
Someone is Violating Copyright Law and Stealing My Content
Sep 9, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Someone at Version2 Web Development, Textlinkbrokers, and 360 Enterprises is stealing my content, in clear violation of U.S. federal copyright law. He’s responsible for a splog located at charliesidentitytheftblog.com (no I won’t link to it). He steals my blog posts...
Credit card companies form security council
Sep 10, 2006 by Tom Fragala
This isn’t exciting news. I thought it worth noting for those in the industry. CNET News.com reports… American Express, Discover Financial Services, JCB, MasterCard Worldwide and Visa International announced Thursday the creation of an organization to develop and maintain security...
Prison Inmate Ran Identity Theft Operation Behind Bars
Sep 10, 2006 by Tom Fragala
This is a beaut. A prisoner runs an ID theft fraud ring on the inside. ConsumerAffairs.com has more. An inmate at the Hiawatha Correctional Facility in Kinross, Michigan, was sentenced to 5 to 20 years in the Chippewa County Circuit Court by 50th...
40% of Health Care Insurers and Agencies Lost Data since 2004
Sep 10, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Not sure I am surprised, but we should know how vulnerable we are—because so much of our sensitive data is spread around. ConsumerAffairs has got this story. A report issued by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reveals that privacy breaches...
Company Closing Down Throws Employee REcords in Trash
Sep 11, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Here we have a case of reverse dumpster diving. The employees, smartly, jumped in the dumpter to pull out their sensitive HR files which had their SSNs. This is a perfect example of what I tell people every chance I...
Scammers Send Fraudulent Emails Posing as FBI
Sep 11, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) issued an alert today. There are millions of phishing emails sent every day. This one is notable because the scammers thought it would be effective to pose as the FBI. The FBI has been alerted...
14,000 Phishing Sites in July--An All-time Record
Sep 12, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Over 14,000 phishing websites were detected in July. And this represents over 154 “brands” (Paypal, banks, credit unions, etc.). Got this from Computerworld. The number of phishing sites -- or fraudulent Web sites try to fool people into handing over...
Laptop stolen from American Family Insurance
Sep 13, 2006 by Tom Fragala
There was a break-in that resulted in stolen computers including a laptop. Apparently effects over 2,000 customers. Social security numbers and driver’s license numbers were involved. Read more at wfrv.com. American Family Insurance is warning customers to be wary of...
Nikon Posts Customers Names and Credit Cards on Web
Sep 14, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Nikon puts customer credit cards on web site. I “shutter” to think of the consquences (sorry, couldn’t resist). AP Wire reported this story. Personal information on more than 3,200 subscribers of a magazine published by Nikon Inc. was available on...
Identity Theft Defined
Sep 14, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Even though we all know what identity theft is, I thought I’d revisit some important definitions including federal law. Federal Trade Commission (ftc.gov):"Identity theft occurs when someone uses your personal information without your permission to commit fraud or other crimes."...
Life is Good Data Breach
Sep 19, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Life sucks right now for Life is Good. Stolen credit cards can do that to you. Boston Globe has more....
How to make an ATM machine do your bidding
Sep 21, 2006 by Tom Fragala
A Wired blog called 27B Stroke 6 points to this. A security expert got his hands on the user’s manual for an ATM machine and was able to punch in some codes, turn on “operator” mode, entered some default passwords...
Choicepoint Victims Still Waiting for FTC to Act
Sep 22, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Nearly eight months after regulators trumpeted a settlement with ChoicePoint Inc. over a data breach, the government has not paid any money to victims from a $5 million fund that was to be set up as part of the agreement....
My blog is getting spammed by a marketing executive at TrustedID
Sep 22, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Interesting. The Director of Marketing for TrustedID, Lomit Patel, is posting spam comments on my website/blog. There are two: here and here. According to TrustedID's web site, "Lomit leads all of TrustedID's direct marketing efforts and has 12 years of...
1,137 laptops missing from Commerce Department since 2001
Sep 24, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Have you heard? The Department of Commerce says that 1,137 of their laptops have been lost or stolen since 2001, with 249 of them containing some degree of personal data. 672 of them belonged to the U.S. Census Bureau (part...
New York Times Article on Data Breaches
Sep 25, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Tom Zeller, Jr., writes in the NY Times today Less than two years into the great cultural awakening to the vulnerability of personal data, companies and institutions of every shape and size — like the data broker ChoicePoint, the credit card...
50,000 GE Employees at Risk of Identity Theft
Sep 26, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Apparently the laptop of a General Electric employee was stolen from a hotel room. The laptop has names and SSN on thousands of employees. WTEN-Albany has the (brief) story. ...
Laptops are main source of data breaches
Sep 26, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Research into the source of data breaches has found that "…lost or stolen laptops were the main source of data breaches, rather than good old-fashioned hacking." Another data point that’s perhaps surprising: Datafrom New York state suggests that financial institutions have...
NY Gets 3 New Identity Theft and Computer Crime Laws
Sep 26, 2006 by Tom Fragala
New York Gov. Pataki signed three measures into law today. These bills establish the Consumer Communication Records Privacy Act, place limits on the use and disclosure of Social Security account numbers, and further clarify and define what is considered a...
Why Shopping for the Lowest Price Can Lead to Ruin
Sep 28, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Brian Krebs put together a super article on his Security Fix WaPo blog. It goes deeper and in more nuanced directions than most fluff identity theft pieces. These are a few points that jumped out at me. 1. Having your...
Your Business Contacts Are Selling Your Data--Legally
Sep 28, 2006 by Tom Fragala
There is a new type of company that you might not be aware of. These companies are called business contact marketplaces. It is very different from the data brokers than maintain and sell your personal information. They are unabashedly proud...
Truston Discovers a FDIC Data Security Flaw
Sep 30, 2006 by Tom Fragala
Updated below... Shame on the FDIC. I was tooling around their web site when I stumbled across a page that helps you determine the amount of your FDIC insurance (it may be more than the typical $100,000). I was stunned...
Consumer Protections on ATM-Debit Card Fraud
Sep 30, 2006 by Tom Fragala
What protections do you have when fraud is committed using your ATM-Debit card? Will Visa and Mastercard's zero-liability always apply? (Since it is a debit card, it has Visa or Mastercard logo so it can be used like a credit...