Why People Are Getting Identities Stolen

First off, I'm posting this not becuase I've done these, or planned on doing so, but I would have had the ability to do so. And this is an informational post about how to protect yourself, rather than use it for sie darkness.

You'll hear stories on TV, Newspaper, people in general talking about how they were a victim of identity theft, and many times the people will think they are being stalked by some creeper just because they want THEIR identity. I'm going to say first off, this is entirely wrong, (at least for the most part.) Many reasons why people get their information stolen is because of their own faults. From my previous jobs that I've had where I had to work with a register and money people are too trusting of the cashier, and they think by showing them their ID it'll make them even more secure.

When I worked at a Papa Murphy's Pizza, the credit card machine we had was a bit outdated, but it worked nonetheless. The problem with this was it had no security features when it had an output on the reciept. When it printed the store copy of the reciept, it printed out the entire Credit Card number, Expiration Date, and along with thier full name. Now, that alone is enough to take someone's identity. Especially when it comes to the part of having to look at the back of a card to verify the signature is on the card, otherwise printed on credit cards, it's deemed void. While looking at the back of the card, you're able to see the 3 digit pin used for most confirmation. The real killer comes in when people force their ID upon you, you can easily remember their address needed and any other information you wanted to grab like their birthdates etc.

Though, I've looked up credit card policies in the past about having to show your ID to a cashier, most of the time there's nothing really printed about it, and it's only a store policy. That's where you'll either tell them you don't want to show your ID because you have a right not to, but then again you may not get served. So up to you, Security for a Pizza.

So a way to protect yourself from this kind of method is when your reciept is printed out, ask the cashier to see the store copy of the reciept so you can black out your credit card information, usually best just to leave the last 4 digits of your card for verification needed.

Another big killer on people getting their identity stolen is their disposal of personal papers with their trash. I work at a Goodwill store where people donate bags and bags of stuff, and sometimes they throw their papers in it too just because they were too lazy to throw away themselves. But what they're not realizing is they're giving their Bank Statements, other Financial Records, sometimes Car Titles, medical bills, online bills, bills in general, all this personal information left in a nice stack for someone to grab, go through and devise their own way to get whatever they wanted from this person.

An easy way to protect yourself from this. Rip all your papers up, and rip it up good. Or burn it, or destroy it somehow. All very common sense ways to protect yourselves, and people just aren't doing it. Then they think there's some vast conspiracy of creepers stealing their info, when it's really the 17 year old behind the counter at Kinkos or Pizza Hut.

Imeem.com

I came across imeem.com awhile ago and thought I'd sign up considering I needed a new host for my music. The overall of the site is pretty decent, the only thing I don't like about it is the download feature requires you to have iTunes to download any of the songs, so because of that one little thing, I might end up finding another provider, or looking for some kind of hack for it.

Here's a playlist of what I have on my imeem page.





And you can view my imeem page at imeem.com/drderek




And some history about my music; the way I create my music is a bit different than most musicians, instead of creating my own sounds, I use other people's sounds and royalty-free loops and then I use special software like Acid Pro, Sony Sound Forge, and Fruity Loops, to compose and position the loops in a pattern in which I like. Many people don't like this method of music, but in my opinion, if someone makes a song to their liking, then so be it. That's one of the nice things about having the ability to create to your likings.


But hopefully soon after I get my car fixed, I plan on buying a Korg EMX-1 Synth Machine, looks like this: