Identity Theft

Posted on 3 Jan 2006 at 16:59

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Personal digital assistants (PDAs), smartphones and other portable electronic organisers can also hold personal data. Use password protection at the very least. If you don't, and you lose your device, someone could find out a lot about you.

Passwords and security

Computer passwords are always tricky - you have to remember many different passwords for online banking, email, your work computer, possibly your home PC too, as well as any web-hosting services, access to online mobile phone pages, chat forums and so on. But you can't use the same one all the time - otherwise, should someone find it out, they will be able to own your life easily.

Possibly the simplest thing you can do is list every password you have on a sheet of paper and lock it in a filing cabinet. There is a risk that someone could break into that cabinet or you might leave it unlocked one day, but this is still better than keeping little notes in your wallet or on an unprotected handheld computer.

If you want to manage passwords using your computer, don't ever allow Windows, your web browser or any other program to remember your password. Entering passwords manually is inconvenient, but there are plenty of programs around that can dig out saved passwords from Windows computers.

Instead of keeping a plain list of passwords on your hard disk, use a removable disk such as a CD or USB key. If you want the best protection, encrypt the list using software such as PGP, Steganos Security Suite 7 or the free, but harder to use, GnuPG. Password Safe is a very useful program that is designed specifically for protecting passwords and it is free. It keeps a database of account details for different services and encrypts them automatically. You can download copies for Windows PCs and Pocket PCs from passwordsafe.sourceforge.net.

When you set up an account at a bank, a utility company or many other organisations, you'll often be asked to provide answers to some security questions. Invariably this will include your mother's maiden name. The sad truth is that employees can be corrupt, or corruptible. Or plain stupid. If an employee collects or passes on details such as customers' mothers' maiden names, these can be reused by a criminal who wants to impersonate you. And it will work with every company to which you gave the same answer.

It makes more sense to provide randomly invented answers to such security questions. It's easy to solve the problem of remembering which answer you gave to which company. Create an entry on your password list, or in the Password Safe database, for every service that you've signed up for and, as well as your username and password, list your answers to the security questions.

Monitor your credit

Keep an eye on your bank and credit card statements. If you see any unusual activity, report it to the company immediately. The UK's Association for Payment Clearing Services (APACS) says that identity theft accounted for £16m worth of fraud in the first half of 2005.

The majority of plastic card fraud is due to so-called card not present (CNP) fraud, where an unauthorised person has bought online, via mail order or over the telephone using someone else's card details. This doesn't really count as identity theft, but it's still a threat worth mentioning, particularly as CNP-related fraud rose by 29 per cent in just one year. In January to June 2004 it accounted for over £70m, but between January and June 2005 over £90m was stolen.