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

Unfortunately, ID theft appears to be on the rise again. According to Javelin, a leading research firm, in 2011, identity fraud increased by 13 percent. More than 11.6 million adults became victims of identity fraud in the United States, while the dollar amount stolen held steady. Their latest findings in a nutshell:

• Identity fraud incidents increased, amount stolen remained steady—The number of identity fraud incidents increased by 13 percent over the past year, but the dollar amount stolen remained steady. Additionally, consumer out-of-pocket costs have decreased by 44 percent since 2004, likely due to the improved prevention and detection tools that have come available as well as fraud alerts leading to reduced detection time.
• Social behaviors put consumers at risk—For the first time, Javelin examined social media and mobile phone behaviors and identified certain social and mobile behaviors that had higher incidence rates of fraud than all consumers. Despite warnings that social networks are a great resource for fraudsters, consumers are still sharing a significant amount of personal information frequently used to authenticate a consumer’s identity. Surprisingly those with public profiles (those visible to everyone) were more likely to expose this personal information. Specifically, 68 percent of people with public social media profiles shared their birthday information (with 45 percent sharing month, date and year); 63 percent shared their high school name; 18 percent shared their phone number; and 12 percent shared their pet’s name—¬all are prime examples of personal information a company would use to verify your identity.
• Smartphone owners experience greater incidence of fraud—The survey found seven percent of smartphone owners were victims of identity fraud. This is a 1/3rd higher incidence rate compared to the general public. Part of this increase may be attributable to consumer behavior: 32 percent of smartphone owners do not update to a new operating system when it becomes available; 62 percent do not use a password on their home screen—enabling anyone to access their information if the phone is lost; and 32 percent save login information on their device
• Data Breaches increasing and more damaging — One likely contributing factor to the fraud increase was the 67 percent increase in the number of Americans impacted by data breaches compared to 2010. Javelin Strategy & Research found victims of data breaches are 9.5 times more likely to be a victim of identity fraud than consumers who did not receive such a data breach letter.

We share this information to encourage all to be wary of vulnerable areas. For more information and resources, visit www.hvshred.com