IDENTITY THEFT

Global consumers are willing to share their personal information in greater detail than ever before, says a new study released on Monday. Despite the threats online sharing presents, including identity theft, shoppers feel very comfortable disclosing information to retailers in an effort to personalize their own shopping experience.

Personal Information for a Personalized Shopping Experience

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During this holiday season, is it better to give or receive? Scrooge may have learned his lesson, but for identity thieves, it’s neither–they prefer to take, and their latest winter wonderland for victims is Facebook.

Having surpassed 800 million users worldwide, there are plenty of potential targets on Facebook for crooks to go after. Knowing how they go about their schemes will help you be more informed about protecting yourself from Facebook identity theft and similar fraud on other social media websites.

In Online Security: Is Your Small Business at Risk?, Tim Chen of NerdWallet.com explains how small business credit card and bank account information is especially suseptible to identity theft. If you’re interested in learning more, view the references used in writing this article:

Hackers Take $1 Billion a Year as Banks Blame Their Clients (Bloomberg)

When we hear about possible identity theft and data breaches in the news, they almost always involve a large corporation. Remember when the PlayStation network got hacked back in April of 2011? That incident put 77 million people’s credit card info at risk. Scary, right?

By Casey Bond

With the rapid emergence of  web-based financial technology like online banking and trading, the security of user personal information has become a top concern for both consumers and financial institutions. Computers, however, are quickly becoming the second place option for surfing the web, while the use of smartphones is exploding. Unfortunately, with this shift comes a similar one in ID theft and the ability for identity thieves and hackers to see your private data via your phone.

A hacker group behind major security breaches like that of Sony Corp., the CIA and the U.S. Senate, has announced it will be going out of business. The group began its cyber-attacks on major companies and government entities almost two months ago, but has announced via Twitter its “planned 50 day cruise has expired.”

Lulzsec Calls It Quits

Following a string of security breaches on three major organizations–Lockheed Martin Inc, Google Inc. and Sony Corp (twice in their case)–Citigroup was next in line as hackers compromised the security of over 200,000 credit card accounts. Along with this comes news that leading economic experts predict a 15% chance the U.S. economy could fall into another recession. An upside amid all the recent bad news is that we’ve experienced a drop in oil prices, which has translated to slightly cheaper gas.

Citi Security Breach Prompts Stricter Standards

Citigroup announced on Thursday that it has discovered a hacker accessed personal information from its customers. The bank said the security breach occurred last month during which time the hacker stole the information belonging to roughly 200,000 customers.

Routine Monitoring Revealed the Breach

The recession may be officially over, but Americans are still hurting financially. The Department of Labor reports hiring was down last month, and the disappointing news had a ripple effect on the economy as the stock market fell this week. The good news is it’s national doughnut day, and who doesn’t love doughnuts?

Sony Gets Hacked…Again

Sony may have been hit with the second massive data breach in just over a month, says a group of hackers that claim they were responsible for the attack. The group, known as LulzSec, says it pulled off what it describes as an elementary attack on Sony’s “disgraceful” security.

Sony Faces Second Security Breach

While Sony says that it can’t confirm the breach and will be looking into the situation, LulzSec had already posted the data, including passwords, e-mail addresses, home addresses, phone numbers and dates of birth, on its own website.