Role Play Your Way to Personal Security

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Home security and home burglary protection is more than just installing a home security system. The best defense includes a great offense and a solid strategy incorporating a well thought out plan.

Outside of Detroit I worked with local law enforcement to conduct a security seminar at a credit union. This was no ordinary “How to Protect Yourself”, this was a mock robbery done as robbery response training. Best part, cops were the robbers.  And they were good, real good.  Five cops who have watched every cops and robber movie including “Dog Day Afternoon” with Al Pacino were tasked with numerous robber roles. Some as simple as strolling into the bank and passing notes all the way to jumping on the banks counters with assault rifles in masks and screaming profanities demanding the credit unions staff to hit the floor.

It was very realistic and some people cried. Pregnant staff wasn’t allowed to participate and many bowed out. This training was not for the faint of heart. Once the robbers left, the participants had to follow through with what the aftermath response would be and bring the event to a closure.

My role was to observe and when completed to rehash the event and elicit a response from each participant. The energy in the aftermath was a mix of excitement, confusion, fear and relief that it was over.  Everyone in attendance was affected by what they went through. Meaning they were emotionally moved by the process.

At the conclusion of the event the mood was gratitude and a sense of empowerment. People were grateful it wasn’t real, but empowered by the experience. Role playing as we did gave insight to what a real life robbery would look like and once the attendees understood the mechanics of it they felt they were better prepared to effectively respond in the event of a real robbery.

While a mock home invasion may not be on your list of “to-dos,” having a discussion with your fellow dwellers about their response should be. Asking “what if” questions and visualizing different scenarios is one step towards an effective response plan.

Robert Siciliano personal and home security specialist to Home Security Source discussing ADTPulse on Fox News. Disclosures

10 Tips to Secure Online Shopping

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Worried about shopping online safely? Shopping online is unquestionably more convenient and efficient than traditional commerce. However it can be scary when entering your personal information on sites you aren’t familiar with.

The McAfee SECURE™ Shopping Portal lets you shop on thousands of trusted McAfee SECURE sites, so you don’t have to worry about identity theft. At McAfee SECURE Shopping, you’ll find a wide assortment of stores, every one of which has passed McAfee SECURE service daily checks for identity theft, credit fraud, online scams, spam, and adware.

Every merchant in the McAfee SECURE Shopping Portal undergoes daily security scans that address online safety concerns. Each site is tested for phishing and other online scams, as well as affiliations with risky sites, excessive pop-ups, and browser exploits. Only when the merchant’s site has passed each test can they display the “live” McAfee SECURE trustmark.

  1. Offers via an unknown person or offers that are too good to be true should be suspect.  The same goes for offers via tweets and in social media.
  2. Don’t click the links in emails. Always go to the source. Use your favorites menu or manually type in the address in your web browser with a safe search plug-in.
  3. Beware of cybersquatting and typosquatting which may look like the domain of the legitimate eTailer.
  4. Use secure sites. https in the address bar signifies it’s a secure page.
  5. Beware of eBay scammers. Don’t respond to eBay email offers. Review eBayers history. Established sellers should have great feedback.
  6. Pay attention to your billing statements. Check them every two weeks online and refute unauthorized charges within 2 billing cycles.
  7. Don’t use a debit card online. If your debit card is compromised that’s money out of your bank account. Credit cards provide more protection and less liability.
  8. Avoid paying by check online/mail-order. Credit cards have more protection and less liability.
  9. Do business with those you know, like and trust. It’s best to buy high ticket items from eTailers that also have a brick and mortar location.
  10. 10. Secure your PC. Update your critical security patches and anti-virus and only shop from a secured Internet connection.

For more safe online shopping tips, download our e-guide on how to Shop Online with Confidence.

Get three friends to visit the McAfee SECURE Shopping Portal for a chance to win an Apple iPad 2! For every three friends you get to visit McAfeeSecureShopping.com, you’ll get one entry into winning an iPad 2.

Whether you are shopping for yourself or buying a gift for someone, secure shopping online has never been easier with thousands of trusted McAfee SECURE sites.

Go to McafeeSecureShopping.com and start shopping securely today.

 

Card Not Present Fraud Burdens eTailers

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More than 90% of online purchases are made with cards, whether they are credit, debit, or gift cards. A virtual payment that takes place online or over the phone, without physical inspection of the card, is considered a “card not present” or CNP transaction. In a CNP transaction, it is not possible to examine a card’s security features or signature.

This creates a higher degree of risk than when a card is physically present at the point of sale. As a result, merchants pay higher fees for CNP transactions, and they pass those costs on to the customer. Identity thieves can use stolen credit card data to make CNP purchases, or they can copy the data to blank cards, which they can use at self-checkouts or when the thief knows the salesperson, who can “sweetheart” the transaction.

Blank cards can also be pressed with foils to create the appearance of a legitimate credit card. Device reputation, an effective online fraud prevention method, helps protect retailers from fraudulent CNP transactions by examining the computer or other device for a history of unwanted behavior plus any suspicious activity at the time of transaction.

If a customer’s PC, smartphone, or tablet indicates an abnormally high level of risk, the merchant can reject the purchase in advance. iovation, the global leader in device reputation, has blocked 35 million fraudulent online transactions in the last year. Protect yourself from credit card fraud by checking your statements regularly.

As long as you dispute unauthorized credit card charges within 60 days, federal laws limit liability to $50. Unauthorized debit card charges must be reported within two days, or liability jumps to $500. Robert Siciliano, personal security and identity theft expert contributor to iovation, discusses credit and debit card fraud on CNBC. (Disclosures)

Beware of Storm Related Scams

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The crazy (and deadly) weather has scammers and thieves coming out of the woodwork. Whether you have been directly affected by the tornados or not, scammers are preying upon people’s fears.

Beware and never open your door to strangers. Keep your home security system turned on during the day. And beware of phone calls from scammers too.

People dressed as FEMA workers or other officials may go to tornado victims’ homes or even those within 100 miles or more asking for personal information. Badges and uniforms can easily be purchased or created giving the false impression of a legitimate government agency.

Scammers tactics often involves acting as contractors (or even being sleazy contractors with trucks etc) going door to door selling their services pressuring people into writing checks for upfront fees. They may create the impression that if you don’t act now your insurance may not pay claims or you are in imminent danger of being sued because a railing is loose.

Sleazy contractor scammers will refuse to provide contact information or give false information. Many contractors such as carpenters, electricians, or plumbers doing major repair or renovations require licenses and permits.

Other contractors that may not need licenses are roofers, pavers, mold removal, foundation repair etc. Scammers often pose as these unlicensed contractors that scam the most.

Any time a door to door salesmen is offering construction related services be suspect.

Robert Siciliano personal and home security specialist to Home Security Source discussing scammers and thieves on The Big Idea with Donnie Deutsch. Disclosures.

 

Scammers Spoof College Website

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Reed College’s entire website was recently copied and replicated, but with the fictitious name “University of Redwood.” The Wall Street Journal reports, “Officials at Reed suspect the site is part of a scheme to collect application fees from prospective students in Hong Kong and Asia.” Presumably, scammers could simply collect a fee and then issue a rejection letter several weeks later.

Spoofed websites are generally created in order to phish for consumers’ personal information, or to accept credit card payments for products or services that will never be delivered.

In the case of the nonexistent University of Redwood, it’s entirely possible the website served as the front for a diploma mill.

Diploma mills were born alongside legitimate, accredited online universities. Diploma mills issue degrees that can be used to fraudulently obtain employment, promotions, raises, or bonuses. They can also be used as fake identification, to gain employment under an invented name, impersonate a licensed professional, or use fake documents to obtain a genuine ID with fraudulent information.

Diploma mills model themselves after accredited institutions, right down to the .edu web address. They may even incorporate part of an existing university’s name or logo into their own, or mimic an Ivy League school’s color scheme or website design.

Just like a legitimate school, a diploma mill may actually require students to purchase books, do homework, and take tests. Unlike a legitimate school, the diploma school may make passing a foregone conclusion. In many cases, students can simply purchase a diploma, no questions asked. Many of these organizations are nothing more than glorified print shops.

Before plunking down a dime on any learning institution, do your research. There are websites that publicly expose diploma mills, and the U.S. Department of Education recommends that you consult their database as well as additional sources of qualitative information.

Robert Siciliano, personal security and identity theft expert contributor to iovation, discusses identity theft for the National Speakers Association. (Disclosures)

Breaches Upon Breaches, Sony, X-Factor, LastPass, bin Laden Scams

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When a major corporation like Sony gets hit then you know we are all vulnerable. Sony is a great company and like many great corporations is under constant attack. The landscape of information security is changing every day and criminals are aiming their cyber-weapons at the biggest targets in the world.

TechNewsWorld reports LastPass, the password manager was under attack last week. “Users rely on it to store the myriad user names and passwords they inevitably collect as they go about their business on the Web. With LastPass, they only have to remember one single master password. LastPass handles the rest — including, presumably, security.”

Simon Cowells X-Factor show was hit too. The Daily Star reports “Closely guarded secrets about media mogul Simon Cowell and his new US ­ X Factor show have been “stolen” by sneaky cyber crooks. The personal information and act ­details of more than 250,000 wannabes have also been exposed”.

In an email to the victims of the breach it stated: “This week, we learned that computer hackers illegally accessed information you and others submitted to us to receive information about The X Factor auditions It is possible, however, that the information you did provide to us, which included your name, email address, zip code, phone number (which was optional), date of birth, and gender, may have been accessed”.

Cybercrooks are jumping on the news of Osama Bin Laden’s demise. Spam campaigns and malware that piggy back on the news and seek to trick unwitting computer users into clicking links or opening attachments are making the rounds and McAfee Labs expects to see more over the coming days. Computer users should be cautious and especially on guard when they receive messages that purport to offer photos of Bin Laden’s body, funeral at sea or any additional details.

It is important to observe basic security precautions to protect your identity. However, the safety of your information with corporations and other entities that you transact business with is very often beyond your control. Consumers should consider an identity theft protection product that offer daily credit monitoring, proactive identity surveillance, lost wallet protection, and alerts when suspicious activity is detected on your accounts. McAfee Identity Protection includes all these features in addition to live help from fraud resolution agents if your identity is ever compromised. For more tips on protecting yourself, please visit http://www.counteridentitytheft.com

Robert Siciliano is a McAfee Consultant and Identity Theft Expert. See him discussing how a person becomes an identity theft victim on CounterIdentityTheft.com (Disclosures)

Dumb Criminal Gets Caught Wearing Victims Clothes

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A traveler was in a bus station and put his bag down for 2 seconds to get some food and the bag disappeared.  He called the police and they made their way down to the bus station.

The victim lost a laptop, black and white motorcycle jacket and a black Kiss concert T-shirt.

Now if I was a thief, which I’m not, and I stole something, I wouldn’t hang around the crime scene. My thinking is that’s probably a good way to get nabbed. So anyway the cops came and investigated.

So what do they see? A person walking around wearing a black and white motorcycle jacket and a black Kiss concert T-shirt.

The rest of the bags contents including the laptop, was hidden across the street at a car dealership.

Bags are stolen all the time. Pocket books off the back of chairs, laptop bags sitting next to you in a café or airport, and briefcases in a business luncheon. The list goes on. We think we are safe because people are generally honest. However predators lurk amongst the honest people and snap up their belongings in an instant.

One way thieves steal bags is via a “distraction crime”. They see your bag sitting to your left and they distract you on your right as their accomplice takes your bag.

To protect yourself without having to stress out and stare at a bag all day consider a few things:

Whenever putting a bag down, put it between your feet. The chances of someone taking it diminish.

If you must put it on a chair wrap the bags strap around a chair arm or leg.

Purchase a ‘Bag Alarm” which is like a mini home security system that affixes to your bag and senses movement alerting you to potential theft.

Robert Siciliano personal and home security specialist to Home Security Source discussing Home Security on NBC Boston. Disclosures.

How Much Would You Pay For a Fake Girlfriend?

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They say there’s a sucker born every minute. Not everyone can be sophisticated and worldly. Unfortunately, naiveté invites predators and victimization.

Social engineering is the act of manipulating people into performing certain actions or divulging confidential information. Essentially it’s a fancier, more technical form of lying.

Combine naiveté with predators who use social engineering to manipulate their victims, and you get stories like this one, about an Illinois man who sent more than $200,000 to an “online girlfriend,” who didn’t actually exist. The man believed he had been in a relationship with the fictional woman for more than two years when he called police to report that she had been kidnapped in London. He then explained that over the course of the relationship, he had wired money to bank accounts In Nigeria, Malaysia, England, and the United States at his supposed girlfriend’s request.

It’s not as difficult as you might imagine to get swindled out of your money this way. Everyone wants to love and to be loved, and everyone likes to think they’re too smart to get scammed. The scammer’s advantage is his ability to appeal to a victim’s loneliness, which often trumps common sense and facilitates bad decision-making.

More than 40 million people subscribe to online dating services, and millions of those subscribers develop intimate, albeit virtual relationships with anonymous strangers. The most vulnerable users are often those who married young, divorced, and are now in their late 40s or early 50s, facing a new chapter of their lives. This dramatic life transition can foster a degree of loneliness and uncertainty that is extremely difficult to overcome without support from others.

Dating sites could protect users by incorporating another layer of protection, such as device reputation management, which would analyze the computers, smartphones, and tablets used to create new accounts. By examining the device used to connect to one’s website, the website’s operator can reject new accounts or transactions from users with a history of running online scams and spamming in other online communities.

Robert Siciliano, personal security and identity theft expert contributor to iovation, discusses dating security on E! True Hollywood Stories. (Disclosures)

13 Year Old Busted In Home Invasion

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In California gang members are recruited in their tweens. Kids as young as 12 and 13 are on the streets and engaged in theft and violence like never before. Other big cities aren’t much different. In Boston, where I live, a few kids had passed through my yard and I informed them of what they were doing and my dog started barking. Immediately one pulled a knife out and started yelling profanities and threatened me and the dog!

I called the State Police and they came right down. The kids were 12, 13 and 14. Nothing surprises me anymore.

At the wee hours of the morning in Santa Rosa, CA, 4 residents were awoken to a kid coming through a window and then he opened the door for his accomplice. Obviously they negated a home security system. Immediately they pulled a gun and demanded cash. As it got intense one of the residents was pistol whipped.

Apparently the motivation of this encounter was due to a “disrespect issue”. Shortly after the incident the victims were treated and the home invaders were arrested. The 13 year old was already on probation for another incident.

While this situation ended without anyone getting killed and the little gangsters nabbed, it could have easily gone much worse. Regardless of the motivation of the home invaders, a home security alarm could have very well prevented this whole thing from happening.

Robert Siciliano personal and home security specialist to Home Security Source discussing burglar proofing your home on Fox Boston. Disclosures.

Job Scams Up As Economy Downs

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If you are paying attention to the economists, we aren’t out of this just yet. High unemployment is keeping scammers employed by preying on the vulnerable. While burglaries are up, personal and home security goes beyond home alarm systems. It means scammers are coming from all directions.

In general, there are a few types of job related scams to be aware of. Rule of thumb is if it isn’t a job that you are familiar with or a service you have heard of, it is probably a scam. If it’s not a job you would see printed on a business card, it’s a scam.

“Work at home”, make $1000.00 a week, etc are mostly scams. This can be anything from assembling a product to stuffing envelopes to answering the phone. Most require some kind of initial investment, which should be a tip off. I’m told there are legitimate work at home opportunities out there, but I’ve never met one person who answered a classified ad and is working from home as a result.

While headhunters are real professionals, not all pay for placement services are legitimate. Head hunters generally charge the company for finding the employee and sometimes will charge the employee once hired. You should never pay an upfront fee to find a job.

Job lists being sold that promise a database or printout of employers looking for talent are attractive offers that often come with a full money back warranty. The problem is the lists are often spotty or even non-existent and the warranty is bogus as you will never get your money back.

Some job scams are designed simply to get your personal information including social security number and credit card numbers. Never provide your information over the phone or online. If they insist on a background check get one yourself and send it to them.

Robert Siciliano personal and home security specialist to Home Security Source discussing home security and identity theft on TBS Movie and a Makeover. Disclosures.