Author Archives: admin

LifeLock reviews

LifeLock Command Center protects more than my identity
I’ve been a LifeLock member for almost three years now. I’ve always been satisfied with their service and felt like I received effective identity theft protection at a reasonable price, and felt more secure for having it.
I upgraded my LifeLock membership to Command Center recently, and feel better [...]

Data breach

Data breach at AvMed makes three health insurer data breaches in three months
If the question is when will health care insurers begin protecting their customers’ identities, health information and financial information, in light of the most recent insurer data breach, the answer has to be “when pigs fly.”
AvMed began sending out notifications this week of [...]

Data breach

Non-profit agency increases identity theft risks by mailing tax forms to wrong property owners
It happens every tax season. W2s or 1099s are mailed out with Social Security numbers or tax ID numbers visible through the envelopes window. Or, they are printed on mailing labels and slapped on the outside of the envelopes along with names [...]

Identity theft protection

Prevent identity theft by shredding unnecessary documents
Tax time is the perfect time to clean out old files or set up a new file system. But where do you start? And what do you shred to prevent identity theft?
You should shred any unneeded documents or mail that has your personal information on it, and that doesn’t [...]

LifeLock Review

Consumer review of LifeLock’s Command Center™
I’ve been a LifeLock member for just over two years, and have always been happy with their service. But I recently decided to add LifeLock Command Center™–their new tier of ID theft services—to my membership. I know enough about ID theft to know that no one is ever completely protected, [...]

Data Breach

2009 Identity Theft Resource Center Breach Report
The Identity Theft Resource Center’s numbers on last years’ data breaches are out, but despite some figures that are seemingly good news, the overall picture is muddled if not outright bleak.
Nearly 500 data breaches were reported last year – a 25% decrease from 2008. That’s the first decrease in [...]

Family ID theft protection

The holiday season brings families and friends together. It’s a blessing for some, but for others … not so much. These are the families whose relatives and friends include at least one drug addict, alcoholic, convict, compulsive shopper or gambler or a get-rich-quick scammer. In other words, these are the families who need to worry [...]

Data breach Hall of Shame, 2009

This is the time of year when all the Top 10, Best of, and Worst of lists come out. And just for the folks who worry about data breaches, information security, identity theft and institutional stupidity, ComputerWorld has rolled out their 2009 Data Breach Hall of Shame.
In no particular order–but each special in its own [...]

Notre Dame data breach; ID theft risk for 24,000 employees

A data breach is never a good thing, but when the data breach isn’t discovered for three years, and then those responsible wait two months before notifying those affected and at risk of ID theft … Well, 24,000 University of Notre Dame employees are confronting that situation.
Files containing the employees’ names, Social Security numbers, birth [...]

ID theft risk for BlueCross BlueShield members after data breach

Members will be receiving mail from BlueCross BlueShield any day now, but it won’t be Christmas cards. Instead, they’ll be getting letters warning them that they are at a heightened risk from ID theft because their personal, financial and even medical information may be among the millions of records missing after 57 computer hard drives [...]