Identity theft or identity fraud is a deception, crime, or scam which results in the loss of personal data, credentials, banking information, credit card numbers, to use to commit fraud and impersonate someone else and make unauthorized transactions or purchases.
For some people, identity theft is inconvenient and can be quickly fixed. However, for some, recovery from an identity theft can cost them hundreds or thousands of dollars, along with serious reputational damage. Identity theft occurs when someone steals your personal information and login credentials and commits fraud. There are many forms of identity theft, but the most common is money.
Types of Identity Theft
Financial Identity Theft
When a financial identity is stolen, a person uses another person’s identity or information to obtain a loan, product, service, or profit. This is the most common form of identity theft.
Synthetic identity theft
Synthetic identity theft is a type of fraud in which a criminal combines real (usually stolen) and fake information to create a new identity, which is used to open fraudulent accounts and make fraudulent purchases. Synthetic identity theft allows the criminal to steal money from any credit card companies or lenders who extend credit based on the fake identity.
Child Identity Theft
When your child’s personal information is stolen, someone uses your child’s personal information for various personal purposes. This is common because children usually do not contain information that would bother the offender. Scammers can use your child’s name and social security number to find an apartment, find a job, get a loan, or catch unpaid warrants. Often the victim is a family member, child of a friend, or someone close to the perpetrator. Some people steal personal information from deceased loved ones.
Medical Identity Theft
When a medical identity is stolen, someone pretends to be someone else and gets free medical care.
Criminal Identity Theft
When criminals steal their personal information, they avoid subpoenas, find and arrest arrest warrants in their real names, and escape punishment.
Tax Identity Theft
Tax Identity theft occurs when someone uses your personal information, such as a social security number, to file a fake or government tax return on your behalf and get a refund.
Online Dating Identity Theft
Online Dating Identity Theft happens when a Romance Scammer tricks you into a romantic relationship with someone you meet online. Cybercriminals use fake data to gain trust in order to extort or extort money from victims.
Online dating can threaten your privacy, reputation, and personal safety. Now let’s take a look at the risks and what you can do to stay safe while looking for that special person. Although unlike Facebook and Twitter, all types of social media accounts have privacy risks, online dating encourages users to openly share sensitive personal information with strangers.
How do Online Dating Scams function?
Dating scams usually work like this:
- Criminals open accounts on dating sites with fake information and photos. Of course, this is an attractive, confident and attractive person. The profile is so good it’s not true.
- They try to connect with other candidates and build relationships online.
- Once the target is mutual and trustworthy, the fraud usually escalates until the thief discovers financial problems. Typical scenarios include asking for money for a trip, meeting in person, or helping the family of a sick thief.
Unfortunately, the main target of love scams is parents. Because as we age, we often spend more and more time alone. Romance scammers generally ask their targets for money to pay:
- For Medical expenses
- Customs fees
- Pending Debts
- Travel Expenses
They usually ask for a wire transfer, or reload gift cards from vendors like Amazon, Google Play, & iTunes.
How to Protect Yourself From Online Dating Scams?
If you wish to look for love online while still protecting yourself against online dating scams, you can start by following a few simple rules:
Don’t overshare information
It is not necessary to post all the information on the Internet. Store personal information such as place of birth, address, email address, phone number, education, and information about your child. It’s also a good idea to prevent the misuse of personal information on social media and other online profiles.
Learn to spot scams
Even though some of the phishing scams are pretty easy to identify, other phishing attempts over an email, messenger, on social networking sites, or websites can look very legitimate. The only way to never fall for a phishing scam is to never click on a link that has been sent to you.
If the email says it’s from your bank and has all the right logos and knows your name, it may be from your bank – or may not be. Instead of using the link in the email, find the website yourself using a search engine like Google. This way you will know you landed on the legitimate site and not some mocked-up fake site.
Keep a Hold of your Money
Don’t agree to transfer money or other property to anyone you meet on the Internet. It doesn’t matter how long you talk. If the other person needs money and has no other “real life” to make it, this can be a warning sign of someone you shouldn’t be with.
