Identity Theft even though punishable by law with up to 15 years in prison, continues to flourish. And one increasingly popular way of capturing personal data is the form of phishing, which happens online.
Many innocent computer users fall victim to this online scam. It has been reported that 5%, and up to 20% of people fell victim to this scam - causing them untold headaches. From getting stuck with huge credit card bills to having their savings disappear from their personal bank accounts.
Phishing is a term coined by hackers. It's a method used by hackers to obtain your personal information for purposes of identity theft by using fraudulent e-mail messages that appear to come from legitimate businesses. These e-mails are designed to fool you into revealing your personal data such as account numbers, passwords, credit card numbers, Social Security numbers and such.
Identity theft is the name of the game. Whose identity you might ask? Yours!
In 1998, U.S. Congress passed the Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act, which made identity theft a federal crime subject to as many as 15 years in prison.
But it looks like that the hackers are either not informed of it or they simply ignore it because they've discovered ways of how to hide their own identity.
They mask their identities by using a wide array of computer servers, opening and closing their operations quickly and working mostly outside the United States. All of this makes it more difficult for U.S. law enforcement to catch up with them.
So identity theft continues to flourish despite the fact that it's a federal crime. And one increasingly popular way of capturing personal data is the form of phishing.
It is a relatively new phenomenon in the world of Internet scams and most anti-spam filters and messaging security solutions are ineffective at stopping them.
Another reason for it is because phishing attacks are growing quite sophisticated and difficult to detect, even for the most technical people.
Many people are getting on the Internet on daily basis while some people are even using the web browser for the first time. As a result, some people are going to continue to be fooled into giving up their personal financial information in response to a phishing email or on a phishing website.
Your online identity is becoming more valuable as more and more day-to-day activities take place on the Web. Activities such as online banking, shopping online, doing business online, making travel arrangements and such. Anyone who can steal your online identity, will do so for intentions of become you in order to carry out all kinds of fraudulent activities in your name.
You may find out when your credit card bill arrives in the mail of the credit card that you have never ordered. Or when a collection agency gives you a call for the unpaid balance of the purchase you've never made from the company you've never heard of.
Well, somebody did it in your name, without your permission and pretending he or she was you.
To get protected, secure your computer with a firewall at minimum. If you're surfing the Internet without fully updated Antivirus software or without a firewall, it's just a matter of days before you become the next victim. A rule of thumb would be to never log into your personal account or make a purchase from unfamiliar computer. You never know what might be lurking on it.
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