Entries by Robert Siciliano

Prankster Creates and Kills Fake Social Media Profiles

This is just weird, but what about social media isn’t weird? We “friend” people we’ve never met. We share our plans, location, and mother’s maiden name with the world. In New Zealand, weird can be defined as a 28-year-old Auckland woman who created and used several fake online profiles depicting young, pretty women to befriend…

Match.com Screening For Sex Offenders a Partial Solution

Dating website Match.com is being sued by a woman who was raped after meeting with a man through Match.com. In response, the website has initiated a system to vet out sex offenders by checking registered users against sex offender registries. Will this prevent sex offenders creating Match.com profiles? No. Will this prevent sex offenders from…

Scams Setting Record Pace

There is limit to what the criminal scammy mind can conjure up. KMOV reports Scammers have been using military photos to trick unsuspecting women on dating websites into giving them money. The scam artists use pictures of soldiers and post them as their own. Once they convince the women to trust them, they ask for…

Security Expert’s Credit Card Hacked

An excellent way to improve one’s level of security intelligence is to follow the writings of Robert X. Cringley, one of my favorite technology know-it-alls. Anyway, Cringley’s credit card was recently hacked. And if his card can be hacked, anyone’s can. Like many cardholders, Cringley received a notification from his credit card company’s fraud department,…

Taking Responsibility for Personal Security

The local police generally (for the most part) do not prevent burglaries or assaults. But they do (hopefully) arrest those who perpetrate these crimes. Crime prevention goes way beyond installing a home security system or locking your doors or putting your lights on timers. Personal security and crime prevention begins with you. It starts with…

Choosing an Enterprise eBanking Security Solution

In Gemalto’s eBanking Security Guide, a question is asked: “Banking is changing, are you?” Banking is a changing business. Since the early 1980’s banking has been going digital and moving online. During the last 10 years, we’ve seen a major shift in the services offered and the behavior of customers. Gemalto’s Senior Vice President of…

Securing a Home with Automation

You know how much you love to and rely on controlling your TV from your couch? I’m a little dumfounded when I can’t find the remote. And by the time I do, I could have easily changed the channel and found what I was looking for, but the process just isn’t the same without the…

Burglars Pose As Doctors, Victims Take Pills

There is unfortunately no limit to how naïve (and stupid) and vulnerable the public is to the evil (and creative) criminal mind when it comes to home security and burglary. I haven’t seen reports of this happening in the US, yet, but in Turkey which is somewhere over there, burglars are actually donning white coats,…