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Ben Bernanke is a victim of identity theft. This is proof positive that it can happen to anyone.
Ben Bernanke - the Federal Reserve Board chairman - was one of hundreds of victims of an elaborate identity-fraud ring, headed by a convicted scam artist known as "Big Head," that stole more than $2.1 million from unsuspecting consumers and at least 10 financial institutions around the country.
How Did It Happen?
On August 7, 2008, Anna Bernanke - Ben Bernanke's wife - was at a Starbucks when her purse was stolen off the back of her chair.
What Was in Her Purse?
It's not good...
- Driver's License (no problem)
- Four credit cards (not so great - the fewer the better)
- Checkbook (no problem)
- Social Security card (OUCH!!!)
So the thieves had Mrs. Bernanke's SSN, Date of Birth (from the Driver's License), home address, and home phone (from the checks). This is the perfect combination of personal data.
It goes without saying that you should never carry your Social Security card in your purse or wallet. It should be tucked away in a very safe place at home or in a bank lock box. You should also limit the number of credit cards you carry. Just think of how many banks you'd like to call and/or fraudulent transactions you want to deal with and limit your cards accordingly.
Who Were the Thieves?
The thieves were part of a crime ring called "The Cannon to the Wiz." Here is the entry from the Urban Dictionary for "cannon":
Cannon - Old school term for a skilled pickpocket. "
These thieves were after personal information as well as checks and credit cards. They worked in government or medical offices or were simple pickpockets or mail thieves. They attended major sporting events in order to target victims with wallets and purses full of loot. One such victim was Donna Pendergast - an assistant Michigan Attorney General. Her experience went like this:
The robber was so adroit he managed to lift the wallet from her purse without her even knowing it. "They took it right out of my purse while it was on my shoulder," she said. "I didn't feel a thing."
Have They Been Caught?
Yes and no.
Federal agents busted the identity theft ring this summer, but George Lee Reid - the one who fraudulently used the Bernanke's checks to steal $9,000 - had the charges dropped against him, but the Feds are now searching for him again on related charges.
More information on this story from Newsweek.
From a recent UC Berkeley report:
More than half of the internet’s top web sites use a little known capability of Adobe’s Flash plug-in to track users and store information about them, but only four of them mention the so-called Flash Cookies in their privacy policies.
Under the direction of Chris Hoofnagle of the Information Privacy Programs at the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, the researchers discovered that most web users aren’t familiar with Flash cookies and that Flash web cookies can’t be controlled through the cookie privacy controls in a browser. Even more interesting was the use of Flash cookies to ‘re-spawn’ or bring back to life traditional browser cookies that had been deleted on customer computers. In the study even several federal government web sites were found to contain Flash cookie ID information. The federal government has a policy of banning the use of traditional browser cookies.
What’s all the fuss about? Internet web sites often attach browser ‘cookies’—small strings of identifying text and numbers—to your computer to help them keep track of you and your preferences when you visit their sites. In theory this is a useful connection between you and the web sites you visit. For instance, an online book vendor could store your customer preferences information to better help you find what you want and make it easier to make your purchases.
However, like many useful, good things on the web, browser cookies have turned out to be an avenue for identity thieves to find us and our personal information. A cookie that no one knows about and that is not controllable through our web browsers, and can be used to re-spawn traditional browser cookies—could be a useful avenue for identity thieves indeed.
Changing Flash Preferences
Removing Current Site Cookies
Turns out, Adobe has a Settings Manager on its site where you can control how Flash cookies are stored along with other things. If you right-click on a piece of Flash code in your browser you can select "Settings" and get to this special place. Or you can just click our handy link: Adobe Website Storage Settings Panel.
What you should be seeing is something like this:
Here you can see which cookies have been written to your computer along with the ability to DELETE all of them. That's something I would strongly consider. Remember, however, that there are some benefits with these cookies. If you frequent sites that use this technology (and many do) you will be deleting some of your settings with those sites and you may have to re-enter text each time you visit.
There is risk/reward with every choice you make in life...
Even if you decide to push the Delete all Sites button, you still have some work left.
Stopping New Sites from Writing Cookies
Even if you deleted the cookies that have already been written to your computer, you'll need to keep new cookies from being written as well. Luckily, Adobe has created a way to do that:
Adobe Global Storage Settings Panel
If everything goes according to plan, you should be seeing something that looks like this:
Here you can tell Flash not to store any cookies in the future. Just drag the slider over to "None" and select "Never Ask Again." That's it!
Flash Cookie Removal Tools
Here are some other tools if you want 3rd party help with managing or controlling Flash cookies:
Windows:
- Better Privacy extension for Firefox -
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/6623 - Ccleaner - http://www.ccleaner.com
Mac OS X:
Flash Cookie Storage Locations
You can always go to the directory where the cookies are stored and remove them manually. It's not a permanent solution - new cookies will get created in the future - but it works.
Windows:
LSO files are stored typically with a “.SOL” extension, within each user’s Application Data directory, under Macromedia\FlashPlayer\#SharedObjects.
Mac OS X:
For Web sites, ~/Library/Preferences/Macromedia/FlashPlayer. For AIR Applications, ~/Library/Preferences/[package name (ID)of your app] and ~/Library/Preferences/Macromedia/FlashPlayer/macromedia.com/Support/flashplayer/sys
GNU-Linux:
LSO files are stored in ~/.macromedia.
Wrap Up
Now you know about the mysterious and curiously difficult to remove Flash cookies. They are pervasive - even on government web sites - and won't be going away anytime soon.
Please post any follow-up questions or concerns below...
A recent article by Kevin Poulsen on Wired.com made a sobering observation: software hackers are becoming as sophisticated in their programming as the software they're trying to attack. Where hacking used to be something of a harmless, if annoying prank by bright, restless kids before they went off and got regular jobs, hackers are increasingly well-funded and making use of state-of-the art technology to design the trojans, viruses and spyware that attempt to get into your computer.
Today, the best hackers have the skill and discipline of the best legitimate programmers and security gurus. They're using mind-bending obfuscation techniques to deliver malicious code from hacked websites undetected. They're writing malware for mobile phones and PDAs.
The Case of the Clever Conficker
Poulsen cited the the worst case of computer infection in recent years, the Downadup worm , also known as the Conficker worm (see “Latest Worm Infect 9 Million PCs”). One reason the Conficker worm spread so quickly was that it was the first widely-released program—good or bad—to incorporate M6, a state-of-the-art cryptographic algorithm developed at MIT. When crypto expert Phillip Porras first dug into Conficker's code, M6 was available only from the websites of MIT and the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technologies—and no one even recognized M6 at first. When it came to implementing M6 the bad guys had beat the good guys to the punch!
Other portions of Conficker were equally impressive: the way it doggedly hunts for anti-virus software on a victim's machine, and disables it; or the peer-to-peer mechanism. "There were points where it was pretty clear that certain major threads inside Conficker C seemed to be written by different people," Porras says. "It left us feeling that we had a more organized team that brought different skills to bear.... They aren't people who have day jobs.
Another reason the Conficker worm wriggled its way into so many computers was the flexibility and responsiveness of its software engineers. Just like legitimate software engineering teams, when the authors of Conficker discovered a security hole in the first release of their program they stayed up nights and patched their code within just a few weeks. Experts are observing new malware coming out as quickly as a couple of days after a new vulnerability is announced.
What You Can Do?
- Be proactive. Now. Believe that you're computers connected to the Internet are at risk and it's up to you to fortify them.
- If your anti-malware software doesn't run automatically get in the habit of running it daily. If you haven't updated your anti-malware software lately, do it today.
- Make sure your operating software is updated regularly. The best method is to let it download and update automatically. Software vendors will update their software as quickly as possible after a serious weakness is discovered.
More Info
Read the article - Future of Cyber Security: Hackers Have Grown Up.
Lately I've received several "smishing" text messages on my phone and I finally captured the audio of a full phone interaction with their voice response system.
Audio of Smishing Call
Here is the audio from a smishing phone call I recorded. Listen closely to see how they use fear to manipulate the victim into providing information.
What is Smishing?
Well, someone somewhere comes up with these cute names for things and "smishing" is no different. It's a play on the term "phishing", and the "Sm" part comes from SMS, which is the technical name for text messages on cell phones (Short Message Service). Did that make sense? If not, here's a description from the fount of all knowledge - Wikipedia:
Similar to phishing, smishing uses cell phone text messages to deliver the "bait" to get you to divulge your personal information. The "hook" (the method used to actually "capture" your information) in the text message may be a web site URL, however it has become more common to see a phone number that connects to automated voice response system.
Scam Tactics 101
As you listened to the call, you should have noticed a few tactics scammers use to get your information:
- Sound Official - The call starts with "You have reached Credit Union's National Association online banking center." That doesn't even make sense, but it sounds good. Scammers will imitate real brands or sometimes use something pretty generic like this, but they're always going to try to look and sound official.
- Create Fear and a Sense of Urgency - It doesn't take long before they start to scare you with "Compromised accounts may ruin your credit, place you in debt with us or other financial institutions." They add "Failure to run this process will result in account suspension or financial penalties." My favorite attempt to scare you is when they threaten you with prosecution if you give inaccurate information - unbelievable.
What Do They Ask For?
In this call, they are trying to capture a credit card number, expiration date, PIN, and card security code. With this information they will attempt to make purchases online with your card, pull money from your account with an ATM, or possibly create a fake card containing your information.
How to Protect Yourself
It should be obvious to most people that these messages are scams. Unfortunately, the scammers just have to get a small percentage of people to fall for these messages to make it worth their time. Just like spam email, if a few people respond it will continue to be financially viable.
What complicates things a bit is some banks are now using text messages as a communication method for alerts or other information. In these alerts they'll often ask you to phone in to confirm a transaction or to alert you to a problem with your account.
If you're concerned at all about the origin of an alert, always call your bank directly using the phone number from a bank statement or official web site. Never call using the number provided in a text message.
Read more about about smishing tactics in this recent Yahoo article.
The Better Business Bureau (BBB) has announced that April 18th is Secure Your ID Day and is offering free document shredding at various locations across the U.S.
You can bring up to three boxes/bags of paper documents and they will shred them on the spot. Even if you have your own shredder I imagine they'll have a bigger one that will be much faster, so it's worth checking out.
What Should You Shred?
If you're wondering what to bring, check out our shredding page and get a few tips. The short answer is you should shred any documents that has a signature, account number, social security number, or medical or legal information (plus credit offers).
Enjoy!
When Barack Obama famously refused to relinquish his treasured BlackBerry, he became the first president in American history to use email while in office. He will also be the first to have to worry about personal internet security.
The president's new BlackBerry is a special modified variation with top-notch encryption features—further details are not being shared with the media. Vice President Joe Biden and other key officials have also been given this most limited of limited edition devices.
But is it Really Hacker-Proof?
But famed hacker Kevin Mitnick says that despite its special security features, no BlackBerry is impossible to compromise. In an interview with Fox News, Mitnick said "It's a long shot, but it's possible. You'd probably need to be pretty sophisticated, but there's people out there who are."
According to Mitnick, who is credited with hacking Motorola, Nokia, Sun Microsystems, FBI, and Pentagon networks (among many others,) the best course of action for a hacker would probably be to infiltrate the personal computer of somebody close to Obama. Then, the hacker would have to use that person's identity to divert Obama to a compromised website that would upload malicious code onto the BlackBerry.
The Most Exclusive List in Washington
That's precisely why the president's security team is keeping his email address such a closely guarded secret. Obama will also have to frequently change his email address.
Who exactly has this address is unknown, but the number is believed to be considerably less than 50, with Biden, advisers David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett, press secretary Robert Gibbs, and chief of staff Rahm Emanuel almost certainly at the top of the list. Beyond that, one can only guess: top supporter Oprah Winfrey, secretary of state Hillary Clinton, celebrity email buddy Scarlet Johanson, DNC chair Tim Kaine? One can only speculate.
If any of our readers are on the list, please let us know so we can send him our suggestions on the economy...
Remember when the McCain campaign had that garage sale a few months back and sold two BlackBerries with hundreds of GOP contacts still saved on them? It may have seemed like a silly blunder to those who heard about it at the time, but it turns out that most of us are just as careless with our mobile phones and handheld devices as the McCain staffers were with theirs.
99% of Cell Phone Recyclers Neglect to Erase Data
According to a study by Regenersis, one of the leading electronics recycling firms in the world, 99 percent of recycled cellular phones are handed over with their owners personal information and contact lists completely intact. The company did a random sampling of 2000 devices in the month of December, and found that only a handful of consumers had bothered to delete information like emails, banking data, or addresses.
How to Remove Data Before Handing Over An Old Cell Phone
Very few recyclers offer the service of wiping devices before they pass them along, but even if they did, you'd still be handing over an extensive catalog of personal information to a perfect stranger and trusting them to do the right thing.
To take matters into your own hands:
- Remove the SIM card from your phone. It's a little plastic memory card usually located behind the back cover underneath the battery.
- Call your service provider and ask them to disconnect the phone from your account.
That's it! That wasn't hard, was it?
Unfortunately, if you own an iPhone or BlackBerry, it can be a little more complicated but these videos should help:
Erasing a BlackBerry
Erasing an iPhone
An Important Disclaimer
If you've got national security secrets on your phone or maybe mission briefings and data from U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, it's important to remember that there's no way to completely erase a handheld device. Sophisticated forensic recovery methods are capable of reversing pretty much any data-destroying trick that doesn't involve a hammer or a blowtorch, so for highly sensitive data, you should probably contact a specialist. For the rest of us though, the above methods should do the trick.
To read more about phone recycling, head on over to Earth911 blog.
It May Be "Salami Slicing." It May Be Petty Theft.
The latest identity theft scheme doesn't aim to empty your debit account or charge you to the credit limit—not yet anyway. According to The Boston Globe, at least 800 credit and debit cardholders have reported finding tiny fraudulent charges on their statements in recent weeks.
The charges range from 21 to 48 cents, and are billed under at two phony business names: "Adele Services" and "GFDL."
The mysterious charges have lead to a range of speculation over the nature of the scam. Some think that the small charges are meant to test the validity of a registry of stolen credit card numbers which may have been resold by the original thieves. If the theory is correct, those whose cards have already been charged can probably expect to be targeted for much larger amounts down the line.
A Slice of Salami
A less likely theory parallels the scam attempted by the main characters in the movie "Office Space," which featured three disgruntled computer programmers who attempt to slowly embezzle money from their company, pennies at a time. The scheme is sometimes referred to as "salami slicing", but usually targets businesses or customers rather than an unconnected group of individuals.
If this theory holds, those who fail to notice that their accounts have been compromised will continue to be targeted for small amounts of money indefinitely. Most likely, the thieves would have to create new false companies with each wave of thefts.
Plan of Action
Regardless of the intent of the perpetrators, the course of action for those who notice small, unexpected charges on their debit and credit card statements is the same:
- Report the charges to your bank or other financial institution.
- Report your card stolen so that you can be issued a new credit card and credit card number.
As always, it's important for everyone to pick carefully through their statements each month (if not more frequently,) looking for charges they don't recognize. Whether a questionable charge is 1 cent, $1, or $100, it should always be treated as a potentially serious problem.
Did that get your attention? Scammers are hoping it will.
Breaking News Malware Emails
An ongoing strategy of scammers is to send out spam emails with shocking or titillating subject lines. They've decided the recent nomination of Barack Obama is a perfect topic and Symantec has reported that emails are showing up that read something like this:
Sample Emails
Subject: Breaking news
Barack Obama refused to be the president of the United States of America
Yours Sincerely,
Cecily Lynn
Subject: What is going on with our country?
Yours faithfully,
Rodney Lynch
The link in the actual emails (we're not linking to anything in the examples above) point to the following site:
What is the Threat?
The site instantly attempts to bypass any browser security and install malware on your computer. If that fails, any link on the site will download and install malware software. The software is called W32.Waledac. Here's what it does, as described from the Symantec web site:
Rest assured that we detect this piece of malicious software under the name W32.Waledac. This particular piece of malware is capable, among other things, of:
- harvesting sensitive information on your computer
- turning your machine into a spam zombie
- establishing a back door on your computer that will allow it to be remotely accessed
How Can I Protect Myself?
Resist the Impulse to Click - scammers will try to provoke an emotional response in order to keep us from thinking about what we're doing. When you see an email like this, think for a moment if it's even reasonable. Ask why someone would send an email like this. What's the point?
Keep Your Software Up to Date - we've recently talked about keeping your Windows systems updated. The same goes for browsers, email clients, or anti-virus software. If you're software is up-to-date, you're more likely to avoid being hurt by scams like this.
By the way, Obama certainly didn't refuse to be president. I watched the inauguration myself and my thoughts and prayers are with him. Whatever your political affiliation or citizenship, we should all hope and work for his success.
The Worst Outbreak in Years
Using a flaw in the Windows Server service that was detected and patched months ago, a single worm has managed to infect nearly 9 million PCs in just over two weeks — and the rate of infection is increasing by the day. In just four days, the "Downadup" worm (which is also sometimes referred to as "Conficker,") spread from an estimated 2.4 million computers to 8.9 million. It has been described by many security experts as the worst outbreak of malicious software in years.
In October, Microsoft sent out a rare emergency security update for all of its operating systems, including Vista, XP, and Windows 2000. Unfortunately, this update seems to have been ignored by a large portion of PC users, leaving millions vulnerable to Downadup.
Full Dangers Still Unknown
Right now the intentions of developers responsible for the malicious software remains unclear. For the time being, the hackers have only bothered to send out a fake security security program, which creates pop-ups designed to annoy users into paying for a worthless program. But Downadup could potentially hijack millions of computers and use them as bots capable of carrying out whatever commands the hackers send them.
That the whole problem could have been averted if users had just bothered installing a patch Microsoft issued long ago, underscores the importance of setting your operating system to automatically download and install security updates. Those with infected computers undoubtedly let the patch languish for months in an update queue, alongside much less essential software updates.
How to Update Windows Automatically
Windows XP
To set your PC to update automatically in Windows XP, simply access the Control Panel in the start menu, click "Automatic Updates," and choose "Automatic."
Windows Vista
For Vista, open Windows Update in the start menu, select "Change Settings," and then select "Install updates automatically."
How to Remove the Worm
Your computer might not be showing any signs of infection or you may have seen some odd behavior.
From Microsoft:
If your computer is infected with this worm, you may not experience any symptoms, or you may experience any of the following symptoms:
- Account lockout policies are being tripped.
- Automatic Updates, Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS), Windows Defender, and Error Reporting Services are disabled.
- Domain controllers respond slowly to client requests.
- The network is congested.
- Various security-related Web sites cannot be accessed.
If your PC has already been infected by Downadup, first install the emergency update, then run the latest edition of Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal Tool to remove the worm from your computer.
More information about the worm is available from Microsoft. You can also read more on Computerworld.
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