Data Theft Soars to Unprecedented Levels 116
A Wired article reports on data loss in 2007, and the numbers aren't good. Credit card and social security theft was at an all-time high, with even more losses expected in 2008. Information thieves, it seems, are just one step ahead of IT security. "While companies, government agencies, schools and other institutions are spending more to protect ever-increasing volumes of data with more sophisticated firewalls and encryption, the investment often is too little too late. 'More of them are experiencing data breaches, and they're responding to them in a reactive way, rather than proactively looking at the company's security and seeing where the holes might be,' said Linda Foley, who founded the San Diego-based Identity Theft Resource Center after becoming an identity theft victim herself."
The downside of exponential-growth computing (Score:5, Insightful)
Something fishy... (Score:5, Insightful)
One step ahead..? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know what the trouble is with the 'myminicity' thing, so I'll just comment on the synopsis.
It has to be noted that since much data these days appears to be stored unencrypted, or removed from the premises by 'interns,' that much of the populace is 'one step ahead.' The advantage the bad guys have, beyond institutional stupidity and negligence, is that there's so many of them willing to exchange the data once acquired.
Not a big surprise (Score:5, Insightful)
One of my friends went dumpster diving at Compusa. On top of finding almost every cable you'd ever need to hook anything up, he found over 70 pages of daily reports disclosing full credit card numbers, expiration dates, first/last names, and card company. Personal checks that were used during that day listed the account #, routing #, first/last name, birthdate, drivers license #, address, phone number, and probably some other stuff. He found this on two separate occasions, with over 300 cards listed total. None of the papers were shredded/torn either. He didn't intend to find this stuff - Imagine how easy it must be for somebody who actually wants the information!
The majority of the population doesn't understand how seriously security needs to be taken when venturing online to make purchases. If people understood going onto unsecured networks/etc was pretty much the same as leaving your credit card/checkbook in the front seat of your car, leaving the doors unlocked, and parking it in a bad neighborhood they might take security more seriously.
Sure - Most of the time if you leave stuff in your car unsecured, it'll be there when you get back. But there's always that small chance it'll get stolen.
Given that data ... (Score:4, Insightful)
IT Security really to blame? (Score:4, Insightful)
RSA Secure ID... (Score:4, Insightful)
It works for managing access to top secret material, hundreds of billions in monetary instruments and the most vital systems of companies in every industry worldwide... I suppose that on an individual basis, any person's assets, credit and livelihood just aren't as important. Or, perhaps the very industries that protect themselves with this system just don't give a fuck about their consumers.
If these folks were landlords, they'd tell every criminal they could find who you are and were you live, and they'd refuse to install a lock on your door.
Re:Stupidest Legal Term (Score:3, Insightful)
I've seen interviews of people who say they no longer can utilize their identity to do the things they expect to be able to do, buy a house, open a credit account, and have their previous credit rating.
So they feel their identity has been stolen.
rd
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
in related news (Score:3, Insightful)
More and more common thieves are learning the value of data. So more of it is being stolen. I bet MP3 player and cell phone theft rates are reaching "unprecedented" levels as well.
Time for *actual* authentication (Score:5, Insightful)
It continues to astonish me that people think of "data theft" as the cause of identity theft.
Data theft is not the problem. The problem is that financial organizations are willing to accept transactions without authentication, or with very weak authentication. Supplying a 9-digit number which is a matter of public record is not a form of authentication. It does not prove that the person speaking is the account holder. Anybody can walk into a store with a fake credit card and buy stuff in my name, no questions asked. People can write checks with my account number on them, and it will be charged to my account. At no point is the slightest attempt made to authenticate the identity of the person making the transaction and certify that they are allowed to post transactions to the account.
There is no way to "plug" these leaks; most of these names and numbers are a matter of public record and must be surrendered in order to make a transaction in the first place. The identity theft problem will not abate until account holders have enhanced authentication options, and the financial institutions are required to use them. Biometrics, physical security tokens, PINs, it doesn't really matter what solution we use. We just need to use something to verify the identify of the person making the transaction. It's the only solution.
Thos who lose it don't bear the consequences (Score:3, Insightful)
Unless and until that changes, all the hand-wringing in the world won't make a hill of beans of difference.
It will take something like Sarbanes-Oxley, making the officers of companies and non-profits, and government workers, who handle our data personally criminally liable for failure to take due care, before there is any change. As it is now, it is a simple cost calculation, and security is pure cost. The people in charge are betting that they can cash in their stock options or get promoted/transferred before the failure to protect data causes a problem.
Last, but by no means least, everything that the naysayers said about Social Security when it was first proposed have come true: the SSID is a national ID number, and is routinely abused; and the Ponzi Scheme has run afoul of demographics. It's time to end the charade: outlaw the use of SSIDs by anyone except the SSA, and to allow people to opt out of SS.
Re:RSA Secure ID... (Score:1, Insightful)
As much as I like RSA keyfobs, they are pricy. Presumably you would get a better price when you buy millions of them though.
However, I'm betting that 5% of the population are going to lose their keyfob every year, 5% will forget the PIN, and another 5% will write the PIN on the keyfob.
PEBKAC (Score:2, Insightful)
Instead of spending more on (company-side) tech there should be more spent on user-side education. Only those who've been a victim of identity theft and the paranoid (waves!) tend to realise exactly how much value there is in our personal information.
I quite regularly enter junk into websites that I feel ask for too much information - no, you don't need my full address and telephone number before I download that article. If there is a legitimate reason why they do need my information (delivery/billing) and the site looks okay then that's fine, but too many websites and for too much information before they'll let you do anything.
Identity Theft, a Corporate Victory by Vocabulary (Score:5, Insightful)
At some point, someone changed the vocabulary, and now we call this "identify theft", and so we make the crime against the person who's name was forged. In fact, this person has nothing to do with this crime, and is an innocent bystander. The bank is charged with protecting my assets, and if they fail to do so, they should be liable, just as much as if someone walked into the bank with a gun and took it!
By convincing society at large that the crime is "identity theft" and not "fraud", the corporations, while not solving the problem of fraud, has made it someone else's problem; namely their customers. And the customers accept this, and direct their ire against the criminals, instead of against the company. (Admittedly the criminals are Bad People, so they do deserve to be feared and hated.)
In some ways, it is a stroke of genius by the corporate world. But not one that we should celebrate.