Don’t Be Spoofed - Secure Your Identity
You should be cautious of the information that you openly share. Telephone communication is often a way for identity thieves to obtain and collect your personal information. Even an e-mail or a survey you receive in the mail is not always safe and secure.
These methods are seldom used by governments, financial institutions or companies for collecting any type of personal information. If an individual or a company tries to obtain your personal information using any of these means, be wary; in all likelihood they are trying to steal your identity by trying to appear legitimate.
Obtaining personal information from unsuspecting people by pretending to be an official, a bank or company authority is a method called “spoofing.” It is not uncommon for identity thieves to pose as a government official or a representative of a bank or company in order to gain your trust. They may even go to the extreme of presenting themselves legitimately, going to great lengths such as reproducing company logos, official letters and creating official looking web sites.
The more commonly used spoofing method that identity thieves use is the “phishing” campaigns, which involves using official looking e-mails containing a request for you to provide private or personal details such as your bank account number, PIN and password.
These e-mails often imply threats of account closure similar consequences if you do not respond. For people who are trusting and have yet to deal with this type of deception, they are likely act on the request for information. Those “old hands” who have encountered this type of thing aren’t easily taken in and don’t fall into the trap as easily. Identity thieves actively target people who are trusting and innocent. This type of deception wasn’t easily achieved before the age of the internet because most dealings were approached face-to-face.
Fortunately, there is a common factor with many spoofing operations; they usually originate from countries where English is not the first language. This becomes evident in their correspondence, which is usually full of mispellings and grammar mistakes.
You can easily lose your credit card information to an identity thief if you unintentionally give away your personal details. When dealing with vendors on the phone or online, ensure that they are companies that you have dealt with before or are reputable. If you are being asked to divulge personal information online, check if the transaction is being done on a legitimate site and on a secure page? Reputable companies are more likely to protect their reputation by offering extreme care in providing you with a secure and honest service.
Zackery Lim has seen first hand how serious identity fraud can be. He now runs an identitytheftproof.com identity theft protection website and guards his private information jealously.
You too can pick up some useful free tips at identitytheftproof.com IdentityTheftProof.com and learn how to
protect yourself.