US Identity Theft Losses Grow

[newweb]

Consumers in the US lost nearly
US$57 billion last year to criminals
who stole their identities, but online
fraud was the culprit in just one in
10 cases, according to a survey
released on Tuesday, January 31st,
2006.

The study by the Council of Better
Business Bureaus and Javelin Strategy
and Research showed that identity theft
cost US consumers 4% more in 2005
that the US$54.4 billion it cost in 2004.
The average fraud rose to US$6,383
from US$5,885. Nevertheless, the number
of adult Americans who learnt that criminals
had stolen personal data and used it to
commit fraud fell to 8.9 million, or 4%, from
9.3 million in 2004 and 10.1 million in 2003.

Data showed that people who were younger
and had lower incomes were more vulnerable.

Results from the phone survey of 5,000
consumers, including more than 500 identity
theft victims, show that while identity theft
remains a big problem, comsumers are
growing less gullible and more vigilant.
The survey, conducted from Oct 17 to Dec
4 last year, showed that Internet fraud
accounts for just 9% of identity theft cases.
Only 3% stemmed from "phishing", were
criminals send email messages asking
prospective victims to verify personal data
through links to real-looking, but fake, websites.

[Queen Bee]

Results from the phone survey of 5,000
consumers, including more than 500 identity
theft victims, show that while identity theft
remains a big problem, comsumers are
growing less gullible and more vigilant.

People start to wise up after they've been burnt over and over again.

I have to continually tell me family to ignore Paypal and eBay fraud e-mails, because they still keep coming. Just last year one of my family members fell victim to this fraud, and nearly lost their account.

[newweb]

To protect oneself, one programmer told me
to look at the source code from the email you'd
received.

Even tho you could have received from PayPal
to verify your account etc with HTTP://www.paypal.com,
when you look at the source code, the 's' is missing
after the 'http'.

Alternatively, go straight to PayPal customer
service and send them the duplicate so that
they can verify it for you.

Apply the same with eBay...

I know this means can be very much a time
waster, but what complaint can you surface
when your account had been tempered with!

[Queen Bee]

I know this means can be very much a time
waster, but what complaint can you surface
when your account had been tempered with!

Exactly!

People need to be careful... Because criminals spread like wildfire when they can do it anonymously over the Internet.