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Computer Identity Theft - Modern Day Confidence Tricksters |
By:
Adrian Fletcher |
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Computer Identity Theft - Modern Day Confidence Tricksters
Adrian Fletcher
The widespread use of personal computers and the internet is a godsend for many identity thieves. The days of rummaging through trash cans looking for personal details like bank account details or a social security number has gone. For today's thieves the tools of trade are the computer and countless bogus email ids. And their pool of potential victims has spread from the local area to the whole world. So it is no wonder that computer identity theft is on the rise and one of the fastest growing crimes to date.
At first glance, you may think that computer identity theft is a high tech crime that is perpetrated by some evil genius or misanthropic computer nerd but the reality is that most of it is very simple. Most computer identity theft is a simple confidence trick that uses a number of techniques that understand human nature.
So, by far the most common form of identity theft relies on triggering a persons fear or greed. These two emotions are incredibly strong for many people and will compel them to take some kind of action. Once these emotions are raised, the identity theft simply tells the potential victim what needs to be done to rectify the situation and gives them an easy way to do this.
A common fear that many people that use computers have is that they will be a target of computer identity theft. They use computers a bit but know that there are some smart people out in the world who can do all sorts of things with computers. One day they receive an email from their bank saying that their bank account was hacked into last night. Please enter their details and then change the password so this can't happen again.
It comes as quite a shock. Has money been taken out of my account ? What did the hacker do ? The email goes on to say that you should login to your account and immediately change the password by filling in the form at the bottom of the mail.
The email looks genuine. The logo at the head of the mail is the bank's logo. The wording of the email has that official sound to it. Some people may fall for this but if you look slightly closer at the mail you will see some things that don't seem to add up. The sending email address has a yahoo suffix to it. The name of the person and title of the person signing the email don't quite sound right. You are wise to be wary.
This is the scenario of the common phishing scam. An identity theft works to gain your trust or confidence by presenting you with an official looking document or email. Once they have gained your trust they present a problem and an effective way of solving this problem. Many people will take the bait and act on the problem. Once the thief has your personal details they can do all sorts of fraudulent activities.
This is the reason why most companies never ask for your details via email. If a company website does ask for information you will notice (or rather, expect) that the site is secure. Most secure websites will tell you about this before you send any information across the internet. A secure website will have an image of a lock on the screen and the screen name will usually begin with 'https'.
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Article Source: http://www.statssheet.com/articles/article77800.html |
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