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FBI investigating how sensitive celebrity data landed on Web

Some hacker or hackers has it out for a handful of celebrities, politicians, and law enforcement officials, including First Lady Michelle Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and pop singer Beyonce.

Collected onto one Web site -- called "The Secret Files" -- is a slew of financial and personal information on these public figures. The data is so sensitive that it has sparked investigations by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies.

The U.S. Department of Justice announced yesterday that the government agencies are looking into how www.exposed.su obtained the Social Security numbers, credit reports, telephone … Read more

Free ways to protect against identity theft

Identity thieves are more active than ever. In 2012, the Federal Trade Commission received more than 2 million consumer complaints overall, and for the 13th consecutive year, identity theft was the most-common complaint category: 369,132 ID-theft reports were added to the FTC's Consumer Sentinel Network in the year, an increase of more than 30 percent from 2011.

Last week the FTC released its 2012 Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book (PDF). According to the report, the fastest-growing category of identity theft relates to government documents and benefits: complaints in this category increased 46 percent from calendar-year 2010. Credit-card fraud (… Read more

Parents, protect your kids from identity theft

Adults are increasingly aware of the risks of identity theft, but how many of us think about protecting our children's identities? This is an issue that we should be thinking about from birth, when baby registries, online birth announcements, and even the "Stork News" sign in the front yard expose kids' personal information--name gender, date of birth, and home address--to the wider world.

Children who get their identities stolen may not know for years, until they grow up and go to apply for a job, student loan, or credit card themselves. You can imagine what a mess … Read more