Identity Theft - The "Information" Crime

One of the fastest-growing crimes in today’s society is Identity Theft. Identity Theft is defined as a form of fraud in which someone pretends to be someone else by assuming that persons identity. There are a number of ways thieves can assume another persons identity such as stealing a person’s social security or credit card number, using the victims credit rating to borrow money, buying merchandise, running up debts and in some cases withdrawing money directly from the victims bank accounts.

The Federal Trade Commission estimates that about 9 million Americans have their identities stolen each year. In most cases the victims have no clue their identity has been compromised until they view a credit statement or are contacted by a debt collector. Depending on the type of theft that takes place, identity theft could take years to repair. Leaving the victim with ruined credit and mounds of bills to pay. Money is not the only thing lost with identity theft, other losses may include loss of employment, rejection for loans, and the possibility of being arrested for a crime the victim did not commit.

Identity Theft begins with the misuse of personal information by the victim. Thieves can obtain this information in a number of ways such as: Dumpster Diving, Skimming a credit card number with a special storage device, Changing the victims address to another location, Old Fashioned Stealing, and Pretexting. Pretexting is the use of false pretenses to obtain your personal information from financial institutions, telephone companies and other sources.

There are many ways to avoid identity theft. Awareness is the first and most important step. You should be aware of how information can be stolen and know how to protect yours. Monitor your personal information and know what to do when you suspect your information has been compromised. The United States Department of Justice uses SCAM. Be Stingy. Be careful about who you give your info to. Check your financial info regularly. Ask periodically for a copy of credit bureau report. And Maintain careful records.

For more information about Identity Theft and ways to protect yourself:

http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/microsites/idtheft/consumers/about-identity-theft.html#Whatcanyoudotohelpfightidentitytheft

http://www.5identitytheftprotection.com/

Downloading Music, The RIGHT way

With the fast-paced lifestyle we are accustomed to living, the days of going to the local music store to purchase a new CD are something of the past. Instead it is possible to sit down at a computer and download music directly to an mp3, ipod, or other electronic device. You are not forced to purchase the whole CD, you can pick and choose the songs you wish to purchase and pay for them only. Downloading music is a great thing to do; however the easiest way to do it is illegal. The hardest part of downloading music is knowing which service to use, LEGALLY.

A judge ruled in favor of 13 music companies in a copyright case against the ever-so popular LimeWire. LimeWire is an online file-sharing service that uses peer-to-peer technology allowing music and other files to be shared via the internet. The distribution of the recordings through LimeWire competes with artist’s sales, and is just down right unfair.

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is trying to prevent anyone from downloading music illegally and the average person, if found guilty could pay a very big fine. The safest thing to do, to protect yourself is to download music legally. There are several legal music downloading sites such as: iTunes, rhapsody, amazon, pressplay.com, and musicnet.com. Although legal music download networks are great the downfalls are: some charge $0.99 - $1.99 per song and they have applied DRM to the songs. DRM stands for Digital Rights Management. This is an invisible layer of software that bodyguards a computer file and limits what you can and can't do with it. For example, you can buy songs from iTunes but are only able to copy to five computers. Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple says he is trying to strip songs of DRM’s.

For full story about the LimeWire lawsuit:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100512/tc_afp/usitmusicjusticeinternetpiracylimewire

For more about DRM’s and music piracy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koOH9qxay08

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1625209,00.html#ixzz0pBbbpoq2

What were they thinking?

The release date for a highly anticipated phone, the iphone 4G, will be released by Apple around June of 2011. This phone is considered by some to be the best of the best. This particular phone has many new features that have not been released on a phone previous to this. Apple along with CEO Steve Jobs, have always prided themselves in secrecy. Leaving the customer and the media wondering what new and wonderful features are to come. So how do they explain the newest prototype being leaked or left behind? According to gizmodo.com, the new phone was found in a bar in Redwood City, CA not far from Apple headquarters. The phone was disguised in a camoflage case as a previous model, the iphone 3G. An Apple Software Engineer, Gary Powell, had the prototype and accidentally left it. The phone was then sold to Gizmodo for $5000.00 and pictures were leaked all over the internet and other news media. Apple executives believe that this leak will hurt the company because customers that have seen the new features will wait until the release date to purchase the phone instead of buying other Apple products.

It seems that this was poor business practices done by Apple. Since Apple is such a large corporation that contributes to some of the best technology in the world, you would think they would imply better security among their employees. This was just poor judgement on Apple to let an employee take the next generation prototype phone away from the facility. Simple practices should have been put in place to prevent these types of issues with security. Where were the check and balances of this company? How could this happen?

Because of this "leak" the only secrets Apple have are the ones made in the short amount of time before the release. Only time will tell.

Pictures and specs of the new phone: http://gizmodo.com/5520164/this-is-apples-next-iphone.

The full story of the lost phone: http://gizmodo.com/5520438/how-apple-lost-the-next-iphone