Again, courtesy of Stop.Think.Connect.org, here are some valuable resources if you think your computer or personal information has been compromised. The following is a list of agencies equipped to help fight cyber-crime. You can file a complaint about Internet-related frauds, scams, and suspicious activity with the following organizations.

• The Federal Trade Commission – The Federal Trade Commission is the nation’s consumer protection agency and collects complaints about fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices.
• spam@uce.gov – If you receive an email that you think may be a scam, forward it to the FTC and it will be stored in a database that law enforcement agencies use to generate legal cases.
• Your State Attorney General – In addition to the FTC, you can also file a complaint with your state Attorney General’s office if you think you may be a victim of fraud. Your state Attorney General’s office handles a wide range of complaints related to consumer protection.
• The Internet Crime Complaint Center – The IC3 is a partnership between the FBI, the National White Collar Crime Center, and the Bureau of Justice Assistance, whose mission is to serve as a vehicle to receive, develop, and refer criminal complaints related to cyber crime.
• reportphishing@antiphishing.org – In addition to forwarding spam to spam@uce.gov, you can also forward spam to reportphishing@antiphishing.org. The Anti-Phishing Working Group is a consortium of ISPs, security vendors, financial institutions and law enforcement agencies that use this email to fight phishing.
• www.bbb.org – The Better Business Bureau accepts complaints from consumers against businesses or services, and is dedicated to fostering an ethical business environment.
• National Crime Prevention Council – The mission of the NCPC is to be the nation’s leader in helping people keep themselves, their families, and their communities safe from crime. To achieve this, the NCPC produces tools that communities can use to learn crime prevention strategies – including a podcast series for children and adults on the facts of cyber bullying, how to prevent it and manage it.
• National Center for Missing and Exploited Children – This nonprofit organization has a Congressionally-mandated CyberTipline as a means for reporting crimes against children. Reports may be made 24-hours a day, 7 days a week online at www.cybertipline.com or by calling 1-800-843-5678.
• Department of Justice – The DOJ’s Computer Crime & Intellectual Property Section tells you where to go to report hacking, password trafficking, spam, child exploitation and other Internet harassment.

HV Shred seeks to be your source for data security news. Visit www.hvshred.com for more.

In recognition of National Internet Safety Month, the National Cyber Security Alliance offers the following tips on Internet Safety.

When it comes to Keeping your devices clean:
• Keep security software current: Having the latest security software, web browser, and operating system are the best defenses against viruses, malware, and other online threats.
• Automate software updates: Many software programs will automatically connect and update to defend against known risks. Turn on automatic updates if that’s an available option.
• Protect all devices that connect to the Internet: Along with computers, smart phones, gaming systems, and other web-enabled devices also need protection from viruses and malware.
• Plug & scan: “USBs” and other external devices can be infected by viruses and malware. Use your security software to scan them.

We’re all in this together, so be a good citizen:
• Safer for me more secure for all: What you do online has the potential to affect everyone – at home, at work and around the world. Practicing good online habits benefits the global digital community.
• Post only about others as you have them post about you.
• Help the authorities fight cyber crime: Report stolen finances or identities and other cybercrime to www.ic3.gov (Internet Crime Complaint Center), the Federal Trade Commission at http://www.onguardonline.gov/file-complaint.aspx (if it’s fraud), and to your local law enforcement or state attorney general as appropriate.

For more information, visit www.stopthinkconnect.org or www.hvshred.com
When it comes to protecting your Personal Information:
• Secure your accounts: Ask for protection beyond passwords. Many account providers now offer additional ways for you verify who you are before you conduct business on that site.
• Make passwords long and strong: Combine capital and lowercase letters with numbers and symbols to create a more secure password.
• Unique account, unique password: Separate passwords for every account helps to thwart cybercriminals.
• Write it down and keep it safe: Everyone can forget a password. Keep a list that’s stored in a safe, secure place away from your computer.
• Own your online presence: When available, set the privacy and security settings on websites to your comfort level for information sharing. It’s ok to limit who you share information with.

Though it’s a grim topic, when it comes to identity theft, it is critical. The deceased are a major target for identity thieves, and we want to help minimize the vulnerability in our community. When someone dies they are placed on the deceased list by the Social Security Administration. The credit bureaus get updates occasionally and then update their data. There is still the possibility of identity theft as the databases slowly get updated. The dead person may also have been a victim before they died. So if you find yourself as the executor of an estate here are the steps you should take:

1) Get a credit report from all three major credit reporting agencies (Experian, Equifax, TransUnion). To do this you will need a death certificate and proof you are the executor. Check for any fraudulent activity when you get the reports.

2) You will also get instructions on placing a credit hold on their file. This will stop any new credit being issued before the database is updated.

3) The credit card offers should stop once everything is updated but after several months if they are still getting them then you should follow up to make sure they have the credit hold in place.
It’s all about being proactive—more challenging in times of suffering, but perhaps all the more important.

For more on identity theft precautions, visit www.hvshred.com

Here’s another scam to be mindful of and share with you family and friends. Criminals gather publicly available data on Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites. Then, they locate a vulnerable relative — generally a grandparent — and call them pretending to be a grandchild travelling abroad and in trouble.

A typical “grandparent scam” phone call using information gleaned from the Internet: “Hi Grandma, it’s Tom. I’m in Mexico on break from (the name of the university he attends). I got into a car accident and need some money to pay for the damage (or emergency medical treatment). Can you wire me $2,000 right away? Please don’t tell my parents because they’ll just get upset.”
In some cases, the scammers pretend the grandchild was arrested and is in jail. If money is wired, the grandparents may be contacted again, and told additional money is needed.

Meanwhile, the victims’ grandchildren are actually safe at home or school.

To pull off these scams, criminals go through social media accounts, searching for information. On many accounts, scammers easily gather names, locations, schools attended, photos and other details that allow them to overcome skepticism when they call the grandparents.

According to the FBI, criminals often call “late at night or early in the morning when most people aren’t thinking that clearly.”

There are variations on the scam, the FBI reports, including:

1. Instead of the “grandchild” making the phone call, the criminal pretends to be an arresting police officer, a lawyer, a doctor at a hospital, or some other person. Sometimes, the phony grandchild talks first and then hands the phone over to an accomplice…to further spin the fake tale.
2. After perusing a soldier’s social networking page, a con artist will contact the individual’s grandparents, claiming that a problem came up during military leave that requires money to address.

If you receive such a call, here are some steps to take:
• Don’t be pressured to act quickly.
• Ask questions that would be difficult to answer unless you were actually in the family.
• Ask to contact the individual directly. Call the parents or friends to see if the grandchild is really traveling.
• Don’t send money unless you’re certain it is your family member.
• If you’ve been scammed, contact law enforcement immediately.

For more on identity theft protection, visit www.hvshred.com

As more and more children are having their credit ratings damaged by identity theft before they think of borrowing a dime, Maryland lawmakers have approved a first-of-its-kind measure to enable parents to take steps to protect their kids.

The Maryland Child Identity Lock bill will allow parents to take the step of freezing their child’s credit at any time. Supporters hope it will be a model for other states to protect not only children, but also disabled and elderly people who can be particularly vulnerable to identity theft.

Credit agencies do not knowingly create credit reports for minors under the age of 18. When credit bureaus collect data for people applying for credit from lending partners, they get a name and Social Security number, but they don’t have data to double check someone’s actual age due to a lack of information sharing between credit reporting agencies and the Social Security Administration.

A study released last year by ID Analytics, a California-based consumer risk management firm, found that about 140,000 identity frauds against minors occur each year. The study was based on a review of more than 172,000 children whose identities were protected through ID Analytics Consumer Notification Serve from April 1, 2010, to March 31, 2011.

Overall, children are more likely than adults to be targeted for identity theft, according to researchers at Carnegie Mellon University. The researchers worked with an identity theft protection company to comb through records of 42,000 children and found more than 10 percent showed signs of identity theft.

While there is still a lot of work to do when it comes to protecting children from identity theft, it’s good to see that lawmakers are starting to take notice of the issue, and are creating laws to address the problem. We can always hope that the social security administration will someday become directly involved with the issues surrounding identity theft, and institute some policy or procedure that will allow individuals to protect their Social Security number the same way we can already protect our credit accounts. Simply put, our Social Security number is the biggest liability we have when it comes to identity theft.

For more information on ID Theft protection, visit www.hvshred.com

As part of our on-going goal of keeping the public safe from ID theft, this week’s blog is a reminder to check your credit report regularly. To avoid solicitation and annoying commercial, the best place to go is AnnualCreditReport.com. It is a centralized service for consumers to request free annual credit reports. It was created by the three nationwide consumer credit reporting companies – Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

AnnualCreditReport.com provides consumers with the secure means to request and obtain a free credit report once every 12 months from each of the three nationwide consumer credit reporting companies in accordance with the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACT Act).

AnnualCreditReport.com offers consumers a fast and convenient way to request, view and print their credit reports in a secure Internet environment. We also provide options to request reports by telephone and by mail.

AnnualCreditReport.com is the only service authorized by Equifax, Experian and TransUnion for this purpose. The three nationwide consumer credit reporting companies have always encouraged consumers to regularly review their credit reports.

Please note that, as a security precaution,
Consumers should never provide their personal information to any other company or person for requesting free annual credit reports under the FACT Act.
AnnualCreditReport.com will not approach consumers via email, telemarketing or direct mail solicitations.

For more on ID Theft resources, please visit www.hvshred.com

HV Shred is a security company focused on helping the community maximize safety and minimize risk when it comes to personally identifying information. Consumer Reports June 2012 issue feature some helpful Facebook tips we want to pass along:
(1) Think before you type-Even if you delete an account, some information can remain in Facebook’s computers for up to 90 days
(2) Regularly check your exposure-Each month check out how your page looks to others and review privacy settings.
(3) Protect your basic information by setting the audience for profile terms–such as your town or employer. Remember: “friends of friends” could expose you to tens of thousands.
(4) Know what you can protect–Your name and your profile picture are public. To protect your identity, don’t use a photo, or use one that doesn’t show your face.
(5) “Un-Public” your wall–Set the audience for all previous wall posts to just friends
(6) Turn off Tag Suggest–If you’d rather not have Facebook automatically recognize your face in photos, disable that feature in your privacy settings.
(7) Block apps and sites that snoop–Unless you intercede, friends can share personal information about you with apps. To block that, use controls to limit the info apps can see.
(8) Keep wall posts from friends–You don’t have to share every wall post with every friend. You can also keep certain people from viewing specific terms in your profile.
(9) When all else fails, deactivate–When you deactivate your account, Facebook retains your profile data but the account is made temporarily inaccessible. Deleting the account, on the other hand, makes it inaccessible to you forever.

So have connect, have fun, but be safe!

More on information safety at HVShred.com

Our goal at HV Shred is to help the community increase all avenues of security—including safe web browsing.  Here is the latest on a what the FBI is calling a malware scare:

Domain Name System (DNS) is an Internet service that converts user-friendly domain names, such as www.fbi.gov into numerical addresses that allow computers to talk to each other.  Without DNS and the DNS servers operated by Internet service providers, computer users would not be able to browse web sites, send e-mail, or connect to any Internet services.

Criminals have infected millions of computers around the world with malware called DNSChanger which allows them to control DNS servers.  As a result, the cyber thieves have forced unsuspecting users to fraudulent websites, interfered with their web browsing, and made their computers vulnerable to other kinds of malicious software.

To check if your computer is affected, go to http://www.dns-ok.us/ 

The page will tell you if it thinks your computer is looking up servers correctly. 

That’s not the end-all though. 

A few other steps that should be followed for computer safety regardless of threats.

1. Make sure your Windows Security Updates are up to date (if you have not installed windows updates in a while, it is recommended you do so.  If you’re not comfortable looking at the messages that come up on your computer, go to this web site: http://www.update.microsoft.com and check for updates.

2. Make sure all your plug-in programs are up to date.  This includes Flash, Java, Acrobat, etc.  If you have updates pending, you typically will see an icon on the start bar on the right side that will detail that you have updates from one of these programs.  You can also go on the web to check if you have the latest updates at www.adobe.com and www.java.com

3. As always, keep an eye out for suspicious pop-ups, ads, and other messages that appear out of place.  If you’re not sure about a window pop up, make sure you use the x at the top right of the window to close it.  That will keep programs from running anything malicious. 

Even if you were to be infected, after all of that, the problem is quickly solved by running a scan program that finds and removes it, but if your virus software is up to date, run a manual scan to ensure it’s clean. 

HV Shred is here to help—visit www.hvshred.com

In a recent USAA article, Stacy Cowley, tech editor for CNNMoney shared her nightmare of being a 6 time survivor of identity theft. The central message she imparted was the importance of using big, reputable, well-fortified cash machines.

Seems like the culprit for the majority of her ID Theft experiences were sketchy ATMs, usually those conveniently located in corner delis. As she learned, thieves also like to use these non-bank ATMs; they rig them to capture your card number and PIN. As she says, “use these off-label machines enought times and you’re likely to get hit.”

Stacy’s advice: “Don’t panic!” While ID Theft is scary, in general, banks will immediately freeze your account and reissue a new credit or debit card with a new number. You also get a chance to dispute any transactions.

If your card is stolen, your maximum liability, in most cases, is capped at $50 as long as you report it timely. It’s still frustrating to be cut off from your financial lifelines.

Stacy also recommends keeping a few dollars in cash just in case–it took about a week for her to get reimbursed when her cash was wiped out.

Biggest take away–use bank ATM’s–they’re the least likely to be compromised. Thieves still go mostly for the easy hit–make it hard for them and you’ll have the best chance of staying out of range.

For more id theft prevention tips visit www.hvshred.com