Monday, January 11, 2010

Better to Lose Thousands of Dollars than to Suffer from Identity Scam

Scam about identity of a particular person being used by other individual or syndicate has been there even before the introduction of internet. As the technology advances the scammers in general also become sophisticated. In the past years they could get your personal information through monitoring or keep spying a particular subject. One of the known traditional ways of getting your personal information by fraudster is by conducting survey either personally meet you up using other party surveyor, through telephonic conversation or through courier. Actually there were many ways that had been used before and some are still being used in today’s digital world.

At present most of the scams are made by the use of internet as gateway. Using this technology they can shoot many birds at the same time using with less effort. Imagine if they can fool you with a dollar-cost while fooling another 99 internet users at the same time in a day? The scammer has earned USD 100 in a day or USD 3,000 in a month. What if these 100 internet users (including you) have unwittingly released USD 1,000 each because they had been persuaded by scammers? It’s a huge amount of money for an organization engaged in fraudulent acts!

Identity scam is not just about using your personal data it might be by using other personal records or identity of a person related to you and you as their target to be a victim. Today, those experts in this kind of scam usually hire hackers to get information about a particular person. Once they have already hacked personal data or files they will plan on how they could get money either by threat or by other ways. Sometimes they use someone’s personal information and by telling it to you confidently then you will get convinced that he is your friend or relative seeking immediate help or attention. Fraudsters sometimes also use automation through internet. You are probably not aware that you had filled up a form or registered at unreliable website.

Automated scams usually come from unsolicited emails or the so-called spam mails. Once you have made reply to it then it will be their opportunity to revert to you automatically with the pre-written letters until you will be asked for money. Aside from stealing money from you they have already stolen your personal file. One of the best examples to get you persuaded to disclose your personal information is through a spam mail that you are encouraged to apply for a country or company with high-paying jobs. By giving your CV they will know where you worked or presently working for. They surely will get your birthday, even your middle name and your father’s full name. The information would be sufficient enough for them to plan on how to fool you in the future. If you have realized that you have done it before you need to be cautious. Stealing personal information about you has greater damage than getting scammed for few thousands of dollars so beware of identity theft. They can use it against your advantage. You could be vulnerable to credit card fraud.

Prevention is the best option so every time you fill up with your personal information or registering in a website make sure that they are trusted and reliable. If the damage has been done all you have to do is to be careful and always seek for doubts. Think negatively about any propositions or hot offer! Remember that in order for scammers to succeed are by winning your heart, have full control over your feelings and your impulsiveness in making decisions.

3 comments:

Shawn Mosch said...

Education is the key to fighting scams. Thank you for this article which will educate some people on what to look for.

Shawn Mosch
Co-Founder of Scam Victims United

Crazyhorse said...

Hi Shawn, thanks for dropping by again. It's always my pleasure to impart what I know about scams.
Persuasion is the right word for scammers to be successful. In order to avoid identity theft (IT) we need to always use our head to analyze instead of our emotions. Too good to be true are mostly scams.

For this case, we need to take extra caution before giving our personal data to anyone. Damage from IT is irreversible.

Karol said...

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http://paragonlifeblog.com/2010/07/14/online-dating-a-review/

Karol