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Avoid CC fraud, identity theft during holidays
By Luciano Battistini
Times Reporter
The Katy Times will be featuring a series of articles giving consumers advice on avoiding being victims of a crime. This is the second or a three-part series.
The holidays may be a time for giving but some people are much more likely to be in the mood for taking.
“Identity thieves can easily steal a shopper’s personal information just by walking around the mall or searching online,” state police detective Craig Tuer said.
Identity thieves are like scavengers and the holidays are their feeding season. They lurk in shopping grounds and stalk their prey targeting customers in stores, shopping venues, parking lots, restaurants and even on the Internet.
Consumers are always somewhat vulnerable to identity theft scams but tend to be more vulnerable during the holiday season than at any other time of the year.
“Crowded stores with rushed people and various distractions, and online purchases made via insecure Web sites add to the risk of identity theft during the holiday season,” Tuer said.
An identity is stolen every two seconds. According to the Federal Trade Commission, identity theft is the largest consumer complaint they received this year with Texas as the state having the fourth highest percentage.
The Federal Trade Commission advised, “While you probably can’t prevent identity theft entirely, you can minimize your risk.
"By managing your personal information wisely, cautiously and with an awareness of the issue, you can help guard against identity theft.”
Last year about 10 million identities were stolen. This has been consistent every year for the past four years.
Every year, the average amount of money lost by each victim has risen.
“It takes an average of 600 hours of phone calls, letter writing, etc. for each victim to recover from identity theft,” Tuer said.
The FTC and the FBI offer some important tips to keep in mind to reduce the risk of identity theft and gift card scams.
Making Purchases
•Purses and wallets should be safeguarded. Social Security numbers or cards should not be carried. The only things inside should be identification information and credit and debit cards being used for purchases.
•A credit card should be handled discretely. It should be kept in hands with the numbers covered until it is time to swipe it at the register and subsequently placed back inside wallet.
•One should stay alert. Many times a sales associate needs to verify signatures and will want to see an I.D. card along with the credit card being used. One should always make sure that one receives the credit card back before leaving the store. Sales associates can get frazzled too especially if they worked a long shift.
•All purchase receipts should be kept in a safe place. Receipts are often stapled to shopping bags by diligent store clerks unfortunately making it easy for others to discreetly snatch them off as they walk by.
Shopping online
•Customers should avoid making holiday purchases from the computers using public computers. Web sites often leave personal information and financial data on hard drives after a transaction. Many tech-savvy thieves use viruses and spyware capable of grabbing account numbers and passwords right off your computer.
•Online shoppers should installing reliable virus protection and anti-spyware software on their PC.
•One should never open suspicious-looking emails.
•One should always use secure web servers for online shopping. Look for URLs that display “https” instead of “http.”
•Selecting intricate passwords on credit cards, bank and phone accounts will make it more difficult for thieves to guess a password.
•Verifying a source before sharing information is necessary for decreasing risks of identity theft. Before sharing any personal information, one should confirm the legitimacy of the organization.
Gift Card Scams
Even if thieves do not steal an identity, they have found an alternative way to steal people’s money
“Crooks have found a way to rob gift card balances,” Tuer said.
“If you buy gift cards from a display rack that has various store cards you may become a victim of theft.”
Thieves steal gift cards balances by jotting down the card numbers in the store and then waiting a few days and call to see how much of a balance is available on the card.
Once they find the card is “activated,” they go online and start shopping.
“You may want to purchase your card from a customer service person, where they do not have the gift cards viewable to the public,” said Better Business Bureau of Austin senior vice president for communications Erin Jones, who hears all about these kinds of scams.
The BBB of Austin and the FBI offer some important tips to keep in mind to reduce the risk of identity theft and gift card scams.
Purchasing Gift Cards
•One should never buy gift cards from online auction sites. Some of these cards are real, but many are stolen, counterfeit or used. It’s not worth the risk.
•Only buy gift cards directly from the store issuing the gift card or from a secure retailer’s website.
•One should not buy gift cards off of publicly displayed racks in retail stores.
•One should always carefully examine both the front and back of a gift card before buying it. If the PIN number is visible, one should put the card back and get a different one.
•Always ask the store cashier to scan the gift card in front of you. This will guarantee that your card is valid.
•Always keep a receipt as a proof of purchase as long as there is money stored on the gift card. Since many retailers can track where the gift card was purchased, activated and used, if the card is stolen, some retailers will replace the card if one has a receipt.
•If possible, one should register the gift card at the store’s website. Some companies don’t offer this option, but if they do, they are able to detect fraud more quickly.
The holidays may be a time for giving but some people are much more likely to be in the mood for taking.
“Identity thieves can easily steal a shopper’s personal information just by walking around the mall or searching online,” state police detective Craig Tuer said.
Identity thieves are like scavengers and the holidays are their feeding season. They lurk in shopping grounds and stalk their prey targeting customers in stores, shopping venues, parking lots, restaurants and even on the Internet.
Consumers are always somewhat vulnerable to identity theft scams but tend to be more vulnerable during the holiday season than at any other time of the year.
“Crowded stores with rushed people and various distractions, and online purchases made via insecure Web sites add to the risk of identity theft during the holiday season,” Tuer said.
An identity is stolen every two seconds. According to the Federal Trade Commission, identity theft is the largest consumer complaint they received this year with Texas as the state having the fourth highest percentage.
The Federal Trade Commission advised, “While you probably can’t prevent identity theft entirely, you can minimize your risk.
"By managing your personal information wisely, cautiously and with an awareness of the issue, you can help guard against identity theft.”
Last year about 10 million identities were stolen. This has been consistent every year for the past four years.
Every year, the average amount of money lost by each victim has risen.
“It takes an average of 600 hours of phone calls, letter writing, etc. for each victim to recover from identity theft,” Tuer said.
The FTC and the FBI offer some important tips to keep in mind to reduce the risk of identity theft and gift card scams.
Making Purchases
•Purses and wallets should be safeguarded. Social Security numbers or cards should not be carried. The only things inside should be identification information and credit and debit cards being used for purchases.
•A credit card should be handled discretely. It should be kept in hands with the numbers covered until it is time to swipe it at the register and subsequently placed back inside wallet.
•One should stay alert. Many times a sales associate needs to verify signatures and will want to see an I.D. card along with the credit card being used. One should always make sure that one receives the credit card back before leaving the store. Sales associates can get frazzled too especially if they worked a long shift.
•All purchase receipts should be kept in a safe place. Receipts are often stapled to shopping bags by diligent store clerks unfortunately making it easy for others to discreetly snatch them off as they walk by.
Shopping online
•Customers should avoid making holiday purchases from the computers using public computers. Web sites often leave personal information and financial data on hard drives after a transaction. Many tech-savvy thieves use viruses and spyware capable of grabbing account numbers and passwords right off your computer.
•Online shoppers should installing reliable virus protection and anti-spyware software on their PC.
•One should never open suspicious-looking emails.
•One should always use secure web servers for online shopping. Look for URLs that display “https” instead of “http.”
•Selecting intricate passwords on credit cards, bank and phone accounts will make it more difficult for thieves to guess a password.
•Verifying a source before sharing information is necessary for decreasing risks of identity theft. Before sharing any personal information, one should confirm the legitimacy of the organization.
Gift Card Scams
Even if thieves do not steal an identity, they have found an alternative way to steal people’s money
“Crooks have found a way to rob gift card balances,” Tuer said.
“If you buy gift cards from a display rack that has various store cards you may become a victim of theft.”
Thieves steal gift cards balances by jotting down the card numbers in the store and then waiting a few days and call to see how much of a balance is available on the card.
Once they find the card is “activated,” they go online and start shopping.
“You may want to purchase your card from a customer service person, where they do not have the gift cards viewable to the public,” said Better Business Bureau of Austin senior vice president for communications Erin Jones, who hears all about these kinds of scams.
The BBB of Austin and the FBI offer some important tips to keep in mind to reduce the risk of identity theft and gift card scams.
Purchasing Gift Cards
•One should never buy gift cards from online auction sites. Some of these cards are real, but many are stolen, counterfeit or used. It’s not worth the risk.
•Only buy gift cards directly from the store issuing the gift card or from a secure retailer’s website.
•One should not buy gift cards off of publicly displayed racks in retail stores.
•One should always carefully examine both the front and back of a gift card before buying it. If the PIN number is visible, one should put the card back and get a different one.
•Always ask the store cashier to scan the gift card in front of you. This will guarantee that your card is valid.
•Always keep a receipt as a proof of purchase as long as there is money stored on the gift card. Since many retailers can track where the gift card was purchased, activated and used, if the card is stolen, some retailers will replace the card if one has a receipt.
•If possible, one should register the gift card at the store’s website. Some companies don’t offer this option, but if they do, they are able to detect fraud more quickly.
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