25 Apr
Posted by admin as Identity Theft Advice
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
21 Apr
Posted by admin as Identity Theft Advice
Remember the 1970s classic TV show The Six Million Dollar Man? Back then, six million dollars seemed like a boatload of money and it was. Of course, we would not turn away a winning lottery ticket for $6 million, though this is chump change compared to what one cybercriminal netted throughout his time stealing identities and credit card numbers.
We are talking about Rogelio Hackett Jr., the notorious criminal who stole more than 676,000 credit card numbers that were tied to tens of thousands of fraudulent transactions, with a total of more than $36.6 million. Thankfully U.S. Secret Service busted Hackett in 2009 and he faces up to 10 years in prison on an access device charge and another two years on an dentity theft charge. And, we guess there was no getting around the hard evidence that the Secre Service found because Hackett just plead guilty to these charges.
Since 2002, Hackett hacked into businesses computer networks or by purchased stolen credit card numbers through online carding forums.
If there were a criminal hall of fame with an award for the coolest criminal, it would have to go to the pickpocket. Pickpockets are sneaky creatures who manage to function exactly one degree below the radar.
Pickpockets whisper through society, undetected and undeterred. They are subtle and brazen at the same time. They are like bed bugs, crawling on you and injecting numbing venom that prevents you from detecting their bite until it’s much too late. They aren’t violent like a drug-crazed mugger, or confrontational like a stick-up robber. They have more gumption than criminal hackers, since they don’t hide behind the anonymity of the Internet.
NPR reports that nowadays, picking pockets has become a rare and increasingly difficult crime, thanks to “stepped-up surveillance in most public places,” the dismantling of systems of apprenticeship, heftier sentences, and the widespread use of debit cards.
One pickpocket is quoted as saying, “When people stopped carrying money, that was the beginning of the end of pickpocketing…Pickpockets have no respect for thugs or robbers. We consider t
How low can you go? In Virginia, a man has been accused of identity theft, forgery, and obtaining money by false pretenses.
The 25-year-old accused claims, “I know I’m not guilty of any of theses charges…The day that it aired people were calling me and texting me and asking me what have I done and I was like what are you talking about? I thought I was being pranked.”
He is, however, on probation for similar charges, but he swears that he’s no longer a criminal, though he was six years ago. Well, all right then, I guess he must be innocent!
According to detectives, in one scam he used counterfeit checks to make purchases at various stores, and then returned his purchases to different stores in exchange for cash.
One of his identity theft victims is a 102-year-old woman who recently graduated from the city’s citizen police academy, the oldest person ever to do so. “I don’t know how they got my identity,” she said.
How cool is she? But how difficult