LifeLock

“We’re from the government, and we’re hear to help you.” Everybody knows when they hear those words that things are about to go downhill fast.

“The check’s in the mail.” Yeah, right. Anytime a creditor hears those words, he knows the check’s not in the mail, and probably never will be.

Add this to the list of skepticism-inducing lines: “We deeply regret this incident, and believe the risk that the information will be used is low.”

It seems every time there’s a data breach one of the organization’s stooges is going to have to make that cynical statement to the people whose information has been lost, stolen or posted on the Internet. Then the guy has to say that they’re taking care of their people by offering them credit monitoring.

What they’re really saying is they regret this breach has become public, and they’re going to give their employees or customers the very cheapest, ineffective identity theft “protection” they can find. Credit monitoring will only tell the identity-theft vulnerable masses after their identity has already been stolen and used by the thieves to receive credit in the victims’ names.

Do department heads have to draw straws or play Rock, Scissors, Paper to determine which of them is going to take the fall before the media? Or do a bunch of them get together and compete to see which of them is best able to most believably tell a bald-faced lie?

Data breaches in the first half of 2008 were up 69% over the same period in 2007. Almost 250 million records have been exposed in data breaches. Apparently the people who are handling your personal and financial information aren’t handling it responsibly. If you can’t trust them to protect your information before a data breach, why should you trust them to protect you after?

Put your identity theft protection in the hands of professionals. Visit LifeLock.com to learn more about what effective, reliable identity theft protection really looks like. Enroll using the LifeLock promotion code Defense and receive a discount on service.