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Citigroup: $2.7 Million Stolen From Customers As Result Of Hacking
June 27, 2011, The Huffington Post
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Citibank has been criticized, however, for not offering customers a full year of preventive credit file monitoring services, the standard for large companies having suffered such attacks.
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After a cyberattack hit Citigroup, exposing over 360,000 user accounts, the bank has come forward to reveal just how much money's been lost.
The answer: $2.7 million was lost, affecting about 3,400 people, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. The bank will reimburse customers for their loss. Over 200,000 customers were issued new cards with a notification letter.
Citibank has been criticized, however, for not offering customers a full year of preventive credit file monitoring services, the standard for large companies having suffered such attacks.
Experts have suggested that hackers used spyware to capture data from customers as they logged in, though they were not able to get the CVV codes that accompany the physical card. With 154 million Americans owning credit cards, the incidence of such hacks is only expected to rise.
The first half of 2011 has already seen a number of major hacks, including, but not limited to, a series of hacks on Sony, subsequent hacks on Sega, PBS, the CIA, the Senate, and more.
Identity Theft Ranks No. 1 on FTC Consumer-Complaint List
March 8, 2011, The Wall Street Journal
WASHINGTON—New U.S. Federal Trade Commission data show that identity theft continues to be a top concern for consumers.
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Experts say
thieves are using more sophisticated
tactics to either steal personal
information or con consumers into
willingly turning over information.
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The commission Tuesday released a list of the top consumer complaints received by the agency in 2010, and for the 11th year in a row, identity theft ranked No. 1.
The agency received more than one million complaints last year, and 19% were related to identity theft.
Florida had the highest per capita rate of reported identity-theft complaints, followed by Arizona and California.
Experts say thieves are using more sophisticated tactics to either steal personal information or con consumers into willingly turning over information. Some scammers are using fake identities when applying for jobs, signing up for utility services or filing taxes.
Government documents/benefits fraud, which occurs when someone steals a person's identity to obtain federal benefits such as welfare and unemployment aid, was the most common form of reported identity theft, followed by credit-card fraud and phone and utilities fraud.
Identity theft "continues to be a big problem," said Consumer Federation of America consumer-protection director Susan Grant. "With more and more personal information about consumers being collected by more and more companies, government agencies and others for various purposes, the fact remains that there are still problems with security breaches, where consumers' information is stolen by identity thieves."
She added that consumers are still being tricked into turning over personal information to thieves masquerading as banks or other entities.
"There are lots of root causes of identify theft that still have not been resolved," Ms. Grant said.
Adam Levin, chairman and co-founder of Identity Theft 911, said the economic downturn isn't helping efforts to address ID theft.
"The frontline in the war against identity theft for years has always been the states, and yet every state is in total economic disarray," which means enforcement activities are being cut back, said Mr. Levin.
Debt collection complaints came in second place on the FTC's list, making up 11% of the complaints.
In addition, the data suggest that more consumers are becoming victims of "imposter scams," in which scammers pose as family members or legitimate companies in order to persuade consumers to send them money. The FTC's 2010 consumer-complaint list marks the first time that imposter scams made the top 10.
Complaints about Internet services, sweepstakes, catalog sales, Internet auctions, counterfeit checks, telephone services and credit scores also made the top 10.
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