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Identity theft risks with technology
Identity theft risks with technology
Methods of protecting against identity theft
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Technology has drastically changed within the last 10 years alone. Nowadays we can access Wi-Fi anywhere, we can use our credit cards everywhere and even check Facebook on the go. Those accomplishments are extraordinary, however, with the advancement in technology comes the lack of privacy for our personal information. With all the easy access to our information it makes it hard to protect others from getting their hands on it. Seems that today people left and right are victims of identity theft and still no one takes a stand to protect their information. This is why privacy no longer exists in the 21st century due to the rapid growth of technology.
10 years ago, you would log into your desktop computer and hear the dial tone connecting for what seemed like forever. It would take you 15 minutes to even get to your email account. After you checked your email it would take you at least 5 minutes to long out because page loading took forever. There was no Wi-Fi, you waited for the dial tone and you waited for each page to load. Once Wi-Fi became popular stores across the country slowly began offering Wi-Fi to their customers. Today, one can walk into McDonalds and get on their net and then go to their favorite coffee shop and connect to their network. Wi-Fi has made it possible to access the internet anywhere at any time.
Accessing your credit card information has become easier than ever. In today’s world you can input your information into your profile so that way when you decide to purchase all you have to do to place your order is click ok. Using your credit card has become so easy and accessible for anyone to use it. Remember a time when you had to show ID in order to use a credit card? Those times ...
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Identity theft is something that has been around for some time and it will not be gone anytime in the future. With many of the technology that comes out every year may pose a threat to our privacy and personal information. The harm that an identity theft can cause can be from minor to severe. As a result no one would want to become a victim of an identity theft crime because we would never know if we can even restore everything to its original state. For those that have a dependency on technology, be careful about what you do, what you put on the Internet, what information you give out, this is because it could come biting you back into the future.
The personal connection Americans have with their phones, tablets, and computers; and the rising popularity of online shopping and social websites due to the massive influence the social media has on Americans, it is clear why this generation is called the Information Age, also known as Digital Age. With the Internet being a huge part of our lives, more and more personal data is being made available, because of our ever-increasing dependence and use of the Internet on our phones, tablets, and computers. Some corporations such as Google, Amazon, and Facebook; governments, and other third parties have been tracking our internet use and acquiring data in order to provide personalized services and advertisements for consumers. Many American such as Nicholas Carr who wrote the article “Tracking Is an Assault on Liberty, With Real Dangers,” Anil Dagar who wrote the article “Internet, Economy and Privacy,” and Grace Nasri who wrote the article “Why Consumers are Increasingly Willing to Trade Data for Personalization,” believe that the continuing loss of personal privacy may lead us as a society to devalue the concept of privacy and see privacy as outdated and unimportant. Privacy is dead and corporations, governments, and third parties murdered it for their personal gain not for the interest of the public as they claim. There are more disadvantages than advantages on letting corporations, governments, and third parties track and acquire data to personalized services and advertisements for us.
We are living in world that is growing in technology. Technology is evolving so rapidly, especially in ways that allow us to store personal information. For example, we can look up a purchase with no receipt at a retail store with a swipe of a credit card. Another example, we could go to the doctor and the nurse can print out a copy of all our health records that are stored in the computer by just typing in our full name. Although this may be a way to make things easier for us, it is also a way for people to take our information without permission and do what they please with it. People can hack into the database of retail stores and steal account numbers and people can just say your name and get your health history if the nurse does not ask for a form of identification. Information privacy is a growing concern for Internet and data users. In a report Protecting Privacy in an Information Age: The Problem of Privacy in Public, researched by Helen Nissenbaum of Princeton University, she states:
There is currently a huge growing number of criminals that now do greater and more widespread damage to their victims without ever meeting them. Identity theft surfaced in the early 1990s and turned peoples everyday transactions into a data gathering game. Bits of personal information such as bankcards, credit card accounts, income, social security numbers or just someone name, address, and phone numbers are now collected and could be used illegally by these individuals without anyone’s knowledge.
There is no doubt that the technological advances in recent years have changed the way we live. We are now able to talk to people in any part of the world within six seconds, we can watch events from any country such as the Olympic Games live on television screens in our own living room’s, we can even have interactive video conversations through as small a device as a mobile phone. These advances have benefited millions of people worldwide but we have reached a stage where it is now time to stop and think of what is happening to us as a result of all this automation and modernisation; we are becoming over-dependent on electronic devices to carry out simple tasks, we are becoming less and less aware of people and activities in our own communities, even family activities are gradually becoming a thing of the past.
Scrolling through my Facebook feed on my iPhone, casually looking at my friend’s pictures statuses and updates, I came across a video with an amusing title. I tapped the play button expecting the video to load. Instead, I was redirected to an app asking permission to access my “public information, pictures and more.” I then realized; what I considered to be “private information” was not private anymore. Privacy is becoming slowly nonexistent, due to the invasion of advertising companies and the information we publicly post in the online world. In the essay “The Piracy of Privacy: Why Marketers Must Bare Our Souls” by Allen D. Kanner remarks, how major companies such as Google, Yahoo and Microsoft get billions of transmissions each year on
Identity theft is the stealing and use of someone’s personal information and is one of the fastest growing crimes in the nation (Dole, 2005). According to Federal Trade Commission estimates, identity thieves victimize approximately 10 million Americans every year at a cost of an astonishing $50 billion (2005). Identity theft has been going on for years now and is easily done with the help of today’s technology. According to the Federal Trade Commission, there are six common ways that identity thieves get a hold of personal information. The varieties of methods that are used are dumpster diving, skimming, phishing, changing the victim’s address, stealing, and pretexting (Federal Trade Commission). Once someone’s identity is stolen, accounts can be opened in the victim’s name such as credit cards, loan, and utilities; money can be withdrawn from the victim’s bank accounts and cause financial difficulties or the victim’s personal information may be used for other reasons. While consumers blame credit card companies and credit bureaus for lack of security, credit card companies blame consumers for being too gullible and forthcoming with private information (Shelly, 2010). While the two disagree who is at fault, they both share a deep concern over identity theft. Credit card companies’ refusal to accept that technology is moving too fast for them to keep up and their lack of security with existing accounts provides evidence that it is not the consumer’s fault that identity theft is one of the fastest growing crimes in the nation (Dole, 2005).
But because of how often technology changes, how can it be known that the laws made so long ago can still uphold proper justice? With the laws that are in place now, it’s a constant struggle to balance security with privacy. Privacy laws should be revised completely in order to create a better medium between security and privacy. A common misconception of most is that a happy medium of privacy and security is impossible to achieve. However, as Daniel Solove said, “Protecting privacy doesn’t need to mean scuttling a security measure.
This world has changed, even as 20 years old, I am afraid of where technology is going already everyone is glued to it; as a kid computers were new, but we didn’t care we played outside, and cell phones were for emergencies, not fun. Due to technology privacy almost doesn’t exist in this day of technology anymore, there are secret spy cameras being placed in homes by jealous friends or family; social media sites pushing you to spill your age, looks, feelings, life story, and more, and “Big Brother” and “Little Brother” everywhere. Everyone has to be careful because everywhere there is someone trying to steal someone’s identity whether the reason is for money, for legality in a new country, or even to hide a past troubled life. Privacy in the world has been, is now, and always will be extremely important. Growing up in school after getting my first cell phone I was fascinated with new technology and couldn’t wait for the next cell phone to be released. I was always highly interested in what was next, but that was then when I was a young and obvious little kid, now as a young adult in this day of age I have an entirely different feel for all of it; privacy no longer exists and technology is the primary blame.
Technology and the Invasion of Privacy As citizens of America we are all entitled to our rights of privacy. When something threatens this guaranteed privacy we tend to take extra precautions to prohibit prolonged violation. As the advancing world of technology continues to grow and expand, so do the amount of cases involving privacy invasion. Technology drives these privacy-invading crimes; however, crime also drives technology, creating a vicious cycle.
One important reason that advancements in technology are bad is Personal identifying information can be found by anyone who has a computer. People’s personal information, like address and medical history can be found, because almost everything is online. ID theft is a growing problem in the United States. “The scope of ID theft has grown so quickly that it now takes up a substantial and growing portion of law enforcement resources.” This means that ID theft is becoming a big problem. Once your ID is stolen it can be very difficult to get back what you lost.“Though the costs of getting your money back have declined, victims aren't getting back all of what was taken”. This means that when people’s things get stolen over the internet, they may not get everything back that was taken.Technology is so advances people’s personal information can be accessed by anyone with a laptop, and that is something that needs to be changed.
As technology as advanced, so has our society. We are able to accomplish many tasks much easier, faster, and in effective ways. However, if looked at the harmful impact it has had on the society, one can realize that these are severe and really negative. One of the main concerns is privacy rights. Many people want that their information and personal data be kept in secrecy, however with today’s technology, privacy is almost impossible. No matter how hard one tries, information being leaked through technological advancements have become more and more common. With personal information being leaked, one does not know exactly how the information will be used, which validates the statement that privacy rights have been diminishing and should be brought to concern. Many people do not realize that their information is being used by third-parties and to consumer companies. In conclusion, technology has had a significant effect on privacy
Perhaps the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, said it best when he claimed that privacy is no longer a “social norm.” Virtually everyone has a smart phone and everyone has social media. We continue to disclose private information willingly and the private information we’re not disclosing willingly is being extracted from our accounts anyway. Technology certainly makes these things possible. However, there is an urgent need to make laws and regulations to protect against the stuff we’re not personally disclosing. It’s unsettling to think we are living in 1984 in the 21st century.
As technology penetrates society through Internet sites, smartphones, social networks, and other modes of technology, questions are raised as the whether lines are being crossed. People spend a vast majority of their time spreading information about themselves and others through these various types of technology. The problem with all these variations is that there is no effective way of knowing what information is being collected and how it is used. The users of this revolutionary technology cannot control the fate of this information, but can only control their choice of releasing information into the cyber world. There is no denying that as technology becomes more and more integrated into one’s life, so does the sacrificing of that person’s privacy into the cyber world. The question being raised is today’s technology depleting the level of privacy that each member of society have? In today’s society technology has reduced our privacy due to the amount of personal information released on social networks, smartphones, and street view mapping by Google. All three of these aspects include societies tendency to provide other technology users with information about daily occurrences. The information that will be provided in this paper deals with assessing how technology impacts our privacy.
By transmitting signals at 2.4 or 5 GHz, it allows the waves to transmit more data at a faster rate. Typical Wi-Fi standards are 802.11a, b, g, n, or ac and they can switch up the frequency depending on the model (Brain). Families can create their own wireless network that can be shared between family members without the use of hooking all their devices up to the modem, and can also protect their home network from potential hackers with the use of a TKIP or AES encryption. Businesses can also create a “hotspot” which is an area that has wireless networks for free or at a set fee. This is extremely convenient for commuters that need internet access while they are at work, waiting on a plane, or just sitting at a coffee spot without the need for wires (Cox).