Protecting Your Identity

How much is your identity worth to you? Having your identity stolen can be both financially and emotionally devastating. Protect yourself today.

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Courtesy of the ACCC website.

Identity Theft

Identity theft is a type of fraud that involves using someone else’s identity to steal money or gain other benefits.

Phishing

Phishing scams are attempts by scammers to trick you into giving out your personal information such as your bank account numbers, passwords and credit card numbers.

Remote access scams

Remote access scams try to convince you that you have a computer or internet problem and that you need to buy new software to fix the problem.

False billing

False billing scams request you or your business to pay fake invoices for directory listings, advertising, domain name renewals or office supplies that you did not order.

Threats to life, arrest or other

Threats to life, arrest or other involve demands by scammers to pay money that you supposedly owe and threats if you do not cooperate.

Total combined losses reported to Scamwatch and other government agencies in 2018.

In losses as a result of Investment scams in 2018

Lost as a result of dating and romance scams in 2018.

Scam reports submitted across all agencies in 2018.

Source: Australian Competition and Consumer Comission

Identity Theft – What is it?

Identity theft is fraud. It involves stealing money or gaining other benefits by pretending to be someone else. Having your identity stolen can be both financially and emotionally devastating.

Identity theft can occur in many ways from using credit card details illegally to make purchases, to having an entire identity assumed by another person to open bank accounts, take out loans and conduct illegal business in the stolen identities name.

Identity crime costs the Australian community hundreds of millions of dollars each year. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics at least 5% of the Australian population has been a victim of personal fraud.

Identity Theft is on the increase

Identity theft – usually by skimming and harvesting information from credit and debit cards – is on the rise. Thousands of thieves armed with concealed card readers are using cloned cards to make expensive purchases, or even to assume an entire identity to open bank accounts, take out loans and conduct illegal business in the stolen identity’s name.

Either way, these scams can be financially crippling and emotionally devastating. Worse still, with the advent of new ‘touch and go’ cards, the danger is increasing dramatically. Especially now thieves can even get an app that turns their smartphone into a credit card reader.

So what does it all mean?

How Skimming Works

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Will my Insurance cover my losses?

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The Solution

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How Skimming Works

The new ‘contactless’ cards such as Mastercard®Paypass™ and Visa PayWave incorporate a state-of-the-art computer chip. The chip contains a small radio-frequency identification device (RFID) that transmits information to a compatible reader or scanner. These ‘touch and go’ cards save time by eliminating the need to swipe the card though, or insert it into the EFTPOS terminal. Some cards must be tapped onto the reader terminal, but often they work as long as they pass within 4 to 10cm, depending on the power of the terminal.

The bad news is the scanning distance of the cards and tags can be extended to several feet via illicit technological modifications as reported in an RSA Laboratories report from the University of Massachusetts.

A study by American scientists found that contactless cards are extremely vulnerable to skimming attacks. The report found that an attacker with a hidden card reader can harvest information from a card simply by walking past a potential victim in a public place. The electronic pick pocketer can then quickly and easily clone your card and proceed to rob you blind. The technology allowing a thief to do this is easily acquired and is so unobtrusive, you would never know it has happened – until it is too late

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IF YOU THINK IT WILL ALL BE COVERED BY INSURANCE, THINK AGAIN.

Some insurance companies do provide insurance for identity theft, however it is often limited to the reimbursement of legal fees incurred in defending actions brought against the cardholder for non repayment of loans and the like. In many cases, the insurance does not cover the amount of the loan itself.

Similarly credit card companies will promptly refund monies illegally obtained from credit cards, but NOT from loans illegally made in your name. And that is only part of the pain associated with identity theft. In some cases it can take years to repair the damage done to a person’s credit status, thus causing significant stress and inconvenience. Don’t let it happen to you.

You wouldn’t dare be without virus protection for your PC, so why leave your valuable cards unprotected?

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The Solution

ScanGuard RFID Blocking Sleeves are made in the USA using a revolutionary multi-ply laminate. This laminate contains a security barrier shield that simply blocks the Radio Frequency ID signals from being scanned. Water resistant and tear resistant, there is no possible way for a card to be illegally scanned while it is inside its protective sleeve. For the technically minded, it is designed to shield all contactless credit and debit cards, ISO 14443A/B and EPC Gen1/Gen2 contactless smart cards and any contactless card that operates at 13.56 MHz and above.

No need to take our word for it. The ScanGuard material has been tested by independent laboratories in the USA and has been approved by the US Government and the US National Institute of Science and Technology as FIPS (Federal Information Processing Standards) 201 compliant. ScanGuard is listed on the GSA FIPS 201 Approved Products List under the name Paper Tyger Defender to meet the requirements of preventing the reading of contactless RFID chips.

So now there is a fool-proof way to stop ID thieves in their tracks and, quite incredibly, it only costs a few dollars. It’s a breakthrough innovation called ScanGuard, a specially laminated protective sleeve with a security barrier that blocks those dreaded card readers that thieves use to skim credit cards. There is no possible way for a card to be illegally scanned while it is inside a ScanGuard.

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