Consumers Requires More Assurances Through Better Cyber Security As More Are Becoming Victims Of Ide

By Author: EC-COUNCIL
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Cyber security requires greater protection as more and more consumers are being victims of identity theft and internet data breach. Nowadays, all it takes is a social security number, a password, a credit report or a birth date to be able to steal your identity. Identity thefts continue to raise both on a national and local level. According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), as many as nine million American’s have their identity stolen each year.
Despite the alarming statistics that exist about identity theft, often times many of us assume that it’s not going to happen to us. We get a false sense of security because we live in a small, safe community, or we think our information isn’t worth stealing. The reality is, this crime can and does happen to everyone, no matter the community size or your financial status.
James Van Dyke, the founder of Javelin Strategy & Research, said banks have improved at protecting existing credit card holders but there was still a large problem with criminals cloning identities to take new cards out in other people's names.
"The rise in the amount the average victim ...
... lost can be attributed to the cloning of credit cards in other people's names and rising debit card fraud, which usually take longer to detect and lead to higher losses," Van Dyke said.
In The US, Texas has the 5th highest reported identity theft rate in the nation behind Florida, Arizona, California and Georgia (Texas was third in the prior year).
Experts said cyber criminals have come up with another devastating threat to identity theft. Affecting an estimated 1.5 million Americans overall, according to estimates from Ponemon, medical identity theft poses a threat beyond the headaches associated with fixing financial fraud: The crime alters your medical records and can compromise your care.
Unlike financial ID theft — which can be flagged through credit bureaus — there is no central source for checking your medical records, according to the Federal Trade Commission, the federal consumer watchdog agency.
There are many ways criminals engage in medical ID theft. Common schemes include organized rings that defraud insurance companies and Medicare.
One such ring, busted last October, stands accused of submitting false patient claims on thousands of Medicare beneficiaries to steal more than $163 million, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. The New York-based enterprise made money by using the identities of doctors and patients to submit false claims, according to an indictment.
A federal grand jury in Florida has indicted 20 people, including three doctors, for their alleged roles in a $200 million Medicare fraud scheme.
The defendants, who worked with and for American Therapeutic Corp (ATC) and Medlink Professional Management Group Inc., allegedly schemed to defraud Medicare by submitting false claims for mental health services administered at ATC facilities that were medically unnecessary or not provided at all. The government accuses them of paying kickbacks to patient brokers and owners and operators of halfway houses and assisted-living facilities in exchange for delivering patients to ATC facilities.
Thieves can gather medical information from a variety of places, including breaches from health care companies. California state authorities reported that Health Net Inc., an insurance company based in Woodland Hills, Calif., had lost personal information on 1.9 million current and past enrollees around the nation in January, and only now is making the breach public.
The risk of inaccurate medical records is mushrooming. As the medical industry replaces paper files with linked, electronic databases, the potential harm from inaccurate patient information will cascade, ID theft experts and data security analysts warn.
We have to realized that we are a constant target for cyber criminals as the process of stealing has become something that can be done with the use of databases and computer programs
IT professionals who working with corporations that deal with large consumer database need to do their part to keep those personal information safe. One way to mitigate security breaches is with technical security training. Information security professionals can increase their information security knowledge and skills by embarking on highly technical and advanced training programs. EC-Council has launched the Center of Advanced Security Training (CAST), to address the deficiency of highly technically skilled information security professionals.
CAST will provide advanced technical security training covering topics such as Advanced Penetration Testing, Digital Mobile Forensics training, Application Security, Advanced Network Defense, and Cryptography. These highly technical and advanced information security training will be offered at all EC-Council hosted conferences and events, and through specially selected EC-Council Authorized Training Centers.
ABOUT EC-COUNCIL
The International Council of E-Commerce Consultants (EC-Council) is a member-based organization that certifies individuals in various e-business and security skills. It is the owner and developer of the world famous Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH) course, Computer Hacking Forensics Investigator (CHFI) program, License Penetration Tester (LPT) program and various other information security training programs offered in over 60 countries around the globe. EC-Council has trained over 80,000 individuals in technical security training and certified more than 30,000 security professionals. EC-Council has launched the Center of Advanced Security Training (CAST), to address the deficiency in the lack of highly technically skilled information security professionals.