By Jessica Walker

This months interview is packed full of so many helpful tips that I have decided to feed it to you in a five-part series to make it easily digestible.  Each new segment will be posted every Tuesday and Thursday over the next couple weeks, so be sure to subscribe to the blog to get an email alert every time a new segment is posted.  There will also be a chance to win a prize after each segment, but you will have to visit my column on our blog to learn how to win.

Unfortunately, the inspiration for this interview came from several instances where my personal information and credit card information were stolen.  After cleaning up each occurrence, I printed a free credit report from all three credit agency’s through www.annualcreditreport.com, to check for unauthorized charges.  I also had each agency place a fraud alert on my credit.  The fraud alert is free and lasts for 90 days.

Until a couple years ago, I never knew anyone that was affected by online fraud.  Now I am amazed at how many people I talk to that have had similar experiences.  So this month I am on a mission to save as many of you as possible from becoming a victim to online fraud.  And how do I plan to do that you ask?  Well, I have an expert up my sleeve that has superhero credentials.  This crusader spent 13 years at Microsoft where she was a pioneer in online safety for mobile devices and PC’s for the MSN division.

I’d like to introduce everyone to Linda Criddle, currently the founder and President of LOOKBOTHWAYS, Inc., a company that develops internet safety technologies and products while providing product design, safety reviews, and other consulting services to leading technology companies, regulatory bodies, and law enforcement, as well as offering practical assistance to consumers navigating the online world through a consumer internet safety site, iLOOKBOTHWAYS.com

Linda is also president of the Safe Internet Alliance, devoted to promoting a safe Internet and better educating and protecting all users, especially children, teens and the elderly, from Internet corruption, crime, and abuse by driving initiatives through industry, education, government, and non-profit entities.

Through the above mentioned entities, Linda collaborates with local, state, national and international law enforcement agencies, teaching how to understand and track predators online. Linda also works with government organizations in the U.S. and around the world to advise on, and prepare, internet safety regulations and legislation.

In addition, Linda is an author of the award-winning consumer-oriented books, “Look Both Ways: Help Protect Your Family on the Internet,” and “Using the Internet Safely for Seniors For Dummies.” She has also written “Internet Safety for Educators”, a distance-learning course offered through Universities.

Until next time, here’s to keeping you Safer in the City!

- Jessica

Segment One

Jessica: What should our members do to prevent their identity and or financial information (i.e. credit cards, account numbers) from being stolen on or offline?

Linda: A few key steps can make a real difference in protecting your identity and financial information.

Consider what information about you is online - Search to find the total set of information that you - and others - have shared about you online. What have you posted, friends posted, family members, employers, schools, groups, associations, clubs, teams, and church groups, posted?  If you donate to charities, do their sites place your name and amount of donation on their sites? Have you ever posted a resume? (There is nothing wrong in posting resumes, but restrict contact and address information until you’re actually interviewing, and TAKE IT DOWN when you’ve landed the job!). Check online county records; if you own property find out how much information is available on you and your property - I’ve seen cases where in addition to the basic information, the registrar’s office also displays information about floor plans, and loan papers - which include the name of the lending institution, the loan number, and people’s SSN’s and signatures.  Look to see if they show power of attorney documents, what information is available on your birth certificate, and of any children’s birth certificates. If previously married and divorced what information can be gleaned from these records? Once you have a firm understanding of your footprint of possible exposure, work to remove, or have removed, any information that you don’t feel is appropriate. Discuss with others where your privacy boundaries are so that they do not over-share about you, and ask others for their boundaries so you can be respectful of their safety and privacy needs as well.

Secure your computer. If your computer isn’t protected from viruses and other malware your financial information, your passwords, and everything else you store on your computer or do online will be abused. This concept is so basic, yet only 20% of the US population adequately protects their computers. If the cost of security software is prohibitive, use one of the excellent free services.

Use strong passwords.  Passwords do not have to be hard to remember, just hard to guess. Never use information about yourself as a password. They need to be long (8 or more characters) and use uppercase, lowercase, numbers and symbols. This isn’t hard to do. For example text messaging short-codes can really help make this easy - 2BorNot2B? (To be or not to be, that is the question) or MaybeL8r (maybe later).

Check your credit history and freeze your credit. I’d guess that less than 10% of people consistently check their credit histories to ensure nothing is damaging their credit scores. By law, you have the right to three FREE reports each year. You may choose to pay to have a company monitor your credit for you, but unless you’ve had real trouble with ID theft in the past this is probably not a necessary expense. If you are not actively seeking a line of credit now or in the next month, freeze your credit. This is one of the simplest things you can do, but a step that few actually take. This blocks anyone from taking out a loan or opening a new credit card in your name. It’s easy to do - contact one of the credit bureaus - and is either free or low cost depending on their criteria.

Only purchase from reputable online stores. The price may be cheaper at a store with no reputation, but you don’t want to gamble with your financial information. To find out if a store has a good reputation, the Better Business Bureau has an online site where you should be able to look up this information. Keep all purchase confirmation emails in case you need to dispute something.

Beware of scams. Far too many people ‘give’ away their information to criminals by falling for scams in email and on the web. NEVER use a link provided to you to get to a site, find the URL yourself. You want to be in the drivers seat when going to sites online – that way you end up where you intended to, not on a clever fake site.

Physical world requirements. In addition to the safety steps above, physical items need additional protections. Shred financial documents; far too many people are careless with financial materials yet more ID theft is still carried out the good old dumpster diving way. Protect your possessions like your wallet and purse because a significant amount of ID theft is done by someone the victim knows, including parents, siblings, children and close friends.

Segment 2

Jessica: What are the steps that someone should take if their identity or financial information is stolen?

Linda: If you or someone close to you has been a victim of Identity theft, go to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission Identity Theft site to find out what steps to take and how to report it. In addition, consider:

Report the crime to your local law enforcement agency. This may be a necessary first step to freezing your accounts to prevent further attacks.

Inform family members and friends that their risk could be heightened if the information was stolen from a computer or mobile phone where your address book may have been compromised.

Notify your health insurance company as medical fraud using stolen information is on the rise.

If you know the Website from which your information was stolen, contact the company (if it is reputable) or contact the Better Business Bureau and file a complaint.

Get support. Depending on the circumstances ID theft can be very emotionally draining – your sense of security has been violated. It may leave you suspecting everyone around you, and unsure who you can trust. Recognize that this is a case of broken trust, not just financial loss and a real pain to clean up. Often people are sympathetic when it first occurs, but aren’t as supportive throughout the process. Feelings of abuse or betrayal may come in waves as each step in the process triggers new frustrations (often aggravated by the lack of helpfulness of government agencies and companies).

Jessica: How can the local police help with identity theft or when a credit card or debit card number is stolen online?  Does online fraud fall under the local authorities jurisdiction or a federal agency?

Linda: Online ID theft may fall under both local and federal (possibly even international) jurisdiction. You should always report crimes against you to your local law enforcement agency. They will determine what other agencies need to be involved. Often you need to show you have filed a police report in order for companies to begin removing charges from your account.

Jessica: Your book really opened my eyes to the fraud associated with an individuals medical information.  Please give our members examples of medical identity theft and ways that they can safeguard against it.

Linda: Thank you. Medical identity theft is a very lucrative form of crime. With medical costs skyrocketing, criminals are quick to leverage the opportunities this enables. With a stolen medical identity, criminals can alter the records to show that the person needs prescription drugs – and have them sent to another address. They can indicate the patient needs hip replacement (for example) and ‘resell’ that operation to someone who needs the replacement but can’t afford the full price, pocketing the under-the-counter payment, and so on. While the point is to scam the insurance company, the consequences to you of having your medical records altered may be serious – even fatal – to you in an emergency medical situation.

Segment 3

Jessica: More and more people are using the online banking tools offered by their banks.  While these tools are convenient, how safe are they really?  Is it safer to pay your bills online or through the mail?

Linda: It depends, you can be safe banking and bill paying online if you know how; failing to act appropriately can significantly increase your risks when banking online. Many of the precautions needed here are the same as we’ve already discussed. Learn to minimize your two risk areas – your personal computing environment, and gaps in your internet safety skills – to use online transaction services safely.

Remove risks in your computing environment. Ask yourself:

Is the computer you are using secure? You must have up-to-date security software, which means antivirus and anti-spyware protection.

Is your connection secure? Make sure the firewall is on. If you use a wireless network, it needs to be encrypted so someone outside the house can’t collect your information.

Do you have a secure password? Weak passwords are bypassed in a matter of minutes. You might as well use a strip of scotch tape to lock your front door.

Your biggest threat, once you have secured your computer, is through your own actions online. Cyber-criminals are masters in fooling unsuspecting consumers into exposing themselves to risks. Financial criminals use a thousand ploys, but each ploy has the same key elements. They need to know who you are, where you transact business, and how to access your account(s). So don’t give them this information.

Don’t assume, require proof. A classic method for swindling is to use what appears to be one piece of information to collect more. For example, a scammer sends out a fake email pretending its from a bank notifying recipients that they need to re-enter their account information. Some percentage of recipients will make one or more of the following assumptions.

That the sender knows them

That the sender knows where they bank

That the sender is the bank

That there is in fact a problem with their account

None of these statements is true. But criminals count on a certain percentage of recipients to assume these inferred connections are true.  Those that fall for the assumptions in reality provide the criminal with all three critical pieces of data. By responding, they confirm who they are, where they transact business, and provide their credentials to ‘fix’ the problem.

Don’t misplace trust. Identifying the trustworthiness - or lack of trustworthiness – of the people, email, Websites, content, and businesses you interact with is a critical life skill in any environment – trust the wrong entity and you can loose your life savings.

Steer don’t be pulled. Stay in the driver’s seat and get to websites on your own by searching, don’t be pulled by links that may or may not be legitimate.

Protect personal information. Though it is relatively rare that email is intercepted, never share passwords, social security numbers, credit card information, and the like. What you post online is another potential ‘leak-point’, protect personal and financial information everywhere.

Learn to spot scams. Don’t respond to any e-mail requesting that personal or account information. That “urgent” message may look like it’s from your bank, but it’s bogus. A financial institution would never send you an e-mail asking for your personal information, PIN or password. Never!

If you do all of the above, you have a reasonably strong chance of having only positive experiences. For the record, I use online banking services.

Segment 4

Jessica: Please give our members examples of the information that should be withheld from a dating profile or a social networking profile, information that a criminal could use against them.

Linda: When you are first meeting and getting to know someone online you want to share what you care about, and not much about who or where you are.

Maintain anonymity to protect your identity. Don’t include your full name, phone number, where you work, financial status, or detailed location information in your profile or during early communications with potential dates. Stop communicating with anyone who presses you for this type of information.

Use the e-mail system provided by the dating service rather than your own e-mail address to maintain your privacy.

Be smart about choosing profile pictures and learn how to share photos safely. Make sure your photos reflect what you want to say about yourself. Provocative pictures may attract the wrong people. Make sure that your images do not contain identifying information.

Set your search criteria to filter out anyone with behaviors you may not want to deal with, and check to see if a potential date has a good reputation among other daters on the service.

Be cautious about sharing emotional vulnerabilities. It is very easy for criminals to play to emotions to gain undeserved trust, or to tell a sad story to gain your sympathies. Use a friend as a sanity check – if the story sounds like a stretch to them it probably is.

Note any inconsistencies in what they say about themselves. Periodically reviewing exchanges you’ve had with a critical eye is healthy. This is a real advantage with the Internet, because it IS written down, not something fuzzy in your memory.

Jessica: Safer Dates recently partnered with your company ReputationShare and added a gauge to our member profiles that track online behaviors.  How can our members get the most out of this feature?

Linda: You deserve to experience the Web, and the people you meet through the Web, on your own terms. I was super pleased to learn how much Safer Dates is dedicated to providing as safe an environment as they can, AND how much they respect their users. ReputationShare does two key things for Safer Dates users.

First, it helps the service identify and manage rogue users because, like credit bureaus, ReputationShare literally shares people’s online reputations across participating sites.  If someone has been abusing other Dating sites or their members, Safer Dates can see that information even as the person is registering and take appropriate steps. That said, unlike credit bureaus, the ReputationShare service does not receive or store any information about who the user is. Consumers privacy is extremely important to us. Users stay entirely anonymous, but both positive and negative behaviors associated with their email alias are collected. Of course, we have advanced algorithms to identify email accounts being gamed. Learn more about ReputationShare on www.reputationshare.net.

Second, it gives users the ability to make more informed choices about who they choose to interact with.

Segment 5

Jessica: The majority of us receive emails from friends and family with a request to send the message to a certain number of people and something extraordinary will happen within minutes.  Is there a chance that malware could be added to your computer or the next persons computer if you pass the email on?

Linda: The email messages themselves aren’t going to hurt you – but if they have attachments, downloads, or links included, and you click or download these your chances of getting malware are very high. Never click on the attachments or links in chain mails. Period. And don’t forward them to others. Forwarding these emails at a minimum clogs email servers (an estimated 93% of all email is spam), worst case you are placing others at significant risk for malware.

Jessica: Is it safe to unsubscribe from an emailed advertisement?  Could malware be added to your computer when you unsubscribe?  Is there a national “do not email” list similar to the “do not call” list?

Linda: If you are currently subscribed to the company that (purportedly) sent the email advertisement and you want to unsubscribe, do not use the link in the email. Use a search engine to find the company’s website - so you know you are really on the legitimate site – and then use the unsubscribe option there.

If the email is not legitimate and you click on the unsubscribe link, you will surely have malware trying to get onto your computer.

If you suspect the email is fraudulent, you may want to report it to the company – larger sites usually have a unique “report spam” email address for this purpose.

There is no national ‘do not send spam email to this account’ list; if there was, it would surely be used to send spam.

Jessica: You worked for Microsoft for 13 years and your book naturally addresses Windows and information pertaining to PC’s.  But, I would like to offer advice to our members that have Macintosh computers.  Macs have built in virus protection but that doesn’t mean they are impervious to criminals.  With that said, what tools do you recommend for our members that have Macs?

Linda: Mac users have traditionally felt safe from malware attacks and they were largely safe in doing so because criminals always go for the biggest opportunity and with Windows dominating over 90% of computers, Apple machines were an edge case. As Apple’s market share increases, so have the threats to Mac computers, and iPhones. Unfortunately, the smugness that some Mac users have felt when watching attacks against the Windows OS has led to very poor adoption rates of security software. This is a real mistake. The security and safety advice I have given remains true regardless of the Operating System you run.