Identity Theft Protection Blog with Robert Siciliano

Robert Siciliano Identity Theft Expert
The Smartcard Alliance has released an in-depth report called “Medical Identity Theft in Healthcare.”
While identity theft is a global issue that garners much media attention, most do not realize that medical identity theft is a serious and growing threat. Many authorities consider medical identity theft one of the fastest growing [...]

Spring is here! Thank heavens. I’ve had enough cold and rain to last 50 winters. In the Northeast millions of people are pumping out their basements due to record rainfalls. The Boston Globe reports police want you to know that so you don’t get hit twice from the recent rains: once when your property gets [...]

Robert Siciliano Identity Theft Expert
Medical identity theft occurs when the perpetrator uses your name and in some cases other aspects of your identity, such as insurance information, to obtain medical treatment or medication or to make false claims for treatment or medication. As a result, erroneous or fraudulent entries wind up on your medical records, [...]

Computerworld reported that a hacker threatened to expose health data and demanded $10 million from a government agency. The alleged ransom note posted on the Virginia DHP Prescription Monitoring Program site claimed that the hacker had backed up and encrypted more than 8 million patient records and 35 million prescriptions [...]

In Daytona Beach, Florida, the dumb criminal capital of America, two Florida teenagers are facing charges after breaking into cars. Apparently one teen’s phone was programmed to call 911 and the phone was smarter than the teens and called (maybe accidentally) 911 to inform law enforcement of the crimes taking place.
Dispatchers [...]

When you think about it, Facebook is weird. Where else in the world do you call people who you don’t know your friends? I probably have about 10-15 friends. Most are acquaintances and the others 400 are total strangers.
There’s a lot of excessive trust in the Facebook world. People have [...]

Robert Siciliano Identity Theft Expert
The Wall Street Journal reports under the potentially controversial plan still taking shape in the Senate, all legal U.S. workers, including citizens and immigrants, would be issued an ID card with embedded information, such as fingerprints, to tie the card to the worker.
There are too many forms of identification floating around [...]

Robert Siciliano Identity Theft Expert
The load isn’t getting any lighter for the IT manager. While corporations are still trying to figure out the long term marketing benefits of social media, the security issues faced are a right now a problem.
Many companies restrict internal access. Others prevent employees from discussing or mentioning the [...]

Robert Siciliano Identity Theft Expert

Skimming data off of debit and credit cards has been happening at ATMs, gas pumps and electronic funds transfer point of sale terminals for quite some time.
When criminals plant skimming devices, they have to physically attach a skimming device that fits over the face of the ATM’s card slot. Then [...]

Robert Siciliano Identity Theft Expert
Naiveté: A lack of sophistication or worldliness. That sums up a lot of people I know. “There’s a sucker born every minute” is a phrase often credited to P.T. Barnum (1810 – 1891), an American showman. It is generally taken to mean that there are (and always will be) a lot [...]