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Insights Into Teens: Episode 134 ”Teens and Identity Theft”

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What is identity theft? Why do teens have to worry about identity theft? What are some of the red flags of identity theft? How to stay safe from teen identity theft? What do you do if you think you were a victim of teen identity theft?

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Show Notes

INTRO THEME]

[TRANSITION]

   [SEGMENT 1] 

What is Identity Theft

https://www.idstrong.com/sentinel/why-you-should-watch-out-for-teen-identity-theft/
https://bit.ly/3rknwuu
  • Identity theft is when someone steals your social security number, birth date, and other identifying information and pretends to be you so they can apply for credit cards, mortgages, loans, or commit other types of fraud like filing a tax return with the IRS to get a refund. 
  • Scammers are often total strangers, but they can also be someone related to you or a close friend.
  • Unfortunately, identity theft is very common, and children and teens are often targeted due to the fact they are not yet using their credit.
  • No one is immune to identity theft
  • Typically, criminals target those who are less likely to be aware of teen identity theft, so criminals can ride the money train for as long as possible

What is Teen Identity Theft, How Do Thieves Steal it?

  • Identity theft can happen in various ways; it is the same for teens as adults. 
  • Sometimes scammers steal your mail, hack into your computer or mobile device and steal information that way. 
  • If teens are included in any data breaches, their information may be compromised. 
  • Many schools have been targeted for data breaches lately. 
  • A phishing email is another tool used by identity thieves to get an unsuspecting teen to click a link, enter information or unwittingly download malicious software.
  • Unfortunately, due to the fact that a young person’s information can be used for so long, teens are particularly vulnerable to becoming victims of identity theft. 
  • A thief can purchase a child’s social security number on the dark web for about $2.

Identity Theft Statistics

  • According to a 2018 study two-thirds of all identity theft victims are under the age of 18. 
  • Roughly 20% are between the ages of 8 and 12. 
  • Children are ripe for this type of fraud, and the experts estimate that 1 million children are victims of identity fraud every year. 
  • The losses stemming from identity theft total more than $2.67 billion.
  • According to the same study, teens are more at risk after a data breach than adults. 
    • Their findings showed that 39% of teens were victimized after a data breach, where only 19% of adults were.
    • The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) says that 18-29-year-olds are the group that is most at risk for identity theft. 
    • Those 18 and under are becoming a larger target group as well.

[AD1: SSE]

[SEGMENT 2]

Why Are Teens Targeted for Identity Theft?

  • Teenagers make great targets for scams for a number of reasons. 
  • Identity thieves target people who are easiest and who won’t notice the fraud so they can maximize their profits. 
  • Some reasons that these criminals target teens are:
    • Online Use
      • Teens spend a large amount of time online signing up for accounts, gaming, and communicating on social media. 
      • This makes them very visible as targets. 
      • Teens routinely divulge personal information, including their home address, phone number or whereabouts, through online social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. 
      • These status updates are easily searchable and can lead to an identity thief gathering bits of personal data over time, including a teen’s address, phone number or pet’s name, which might just be the answer of a security question for an online banking account.
      • Online updates about a teen’s whereabouts can also tip off a thief that the individual and his or her family is, say, on a vacation together or at a grandmother’s birthday party. 
      • In other words, the thief suddenly knows that the teen’s home is vacant and can be targeted.
    • Undetected Use
      • Teens — and their parents — rarely check their credit reports. 
      • As a result, identity thieves can go months or years without being suspected. 
      • In addition, since teens’ credit reports are usually blank slates, they allow thieves easy access to first-time credit card offers or loans.
      • Teens won’t start using their credit to take out loans for a while; therefore, the fraudster can use their identity and reap the benefits sometimes for years before the damage is detected. 
      • Usually, teens realize something is wrong when they apply for a driver’s license or attend college and try to take out school loans.
    • Teens Have Unused Social Security Numbers
      • Some teens have unused Social Security numbers. 
      • These are desirable among identity thieves because an individual can pair them with any name and birthdate. 
      • An identity thief can then use or sell the Social Security number so that an someone, can obtain a fake ID for employment.
  • Some Teens Share Banking Info
    • Teens generally aren’t shy about handing off their credit card number to a friend that is buying group tickets for a baseball game or pre-ordering movie theater passes. 
    • This can be problematic if a friend isn’t trustworthy or if someone with ill intentions overhears the exchange of information.
  • Smartphones Are Frequently Misplaced
    • Teens use their smartphones to transmit and store troves of personal data. 
    • Unfortunately, these devices can be easily lost or stolen and land in the wrong person’s hands.
  • They Use Public Wi-Fi
    • When teens use public Wi-Fi, it is easy for an identity thief to obtain personal information that is being transmitted online. 
    • Although teens often view themselves as experts in technology, they should be aware of the fact that hackers and other online predators are often even more advanced and can easily snatch their information.
  • They Use the Same Password for Multiple Sites
    • When teens don’t use complex passwords for their online sites or use the same password multiple times, it is easy for a thief to access their accounts. 
    • The answers to their security questions might also be easy for others to figure out.
  • Teens Don’t Understand Identity Theft
    • Teens are often targets for identity theft because the risk of becoming a victim isn’t on their radar. 
    • They don’t always understand that their actions are making them vulnerable, and they are unaware of the severe consequences.
    • Teens also tend to be unconcerned about identity theft and don’t worry about the consequences believing it won’t happen to them. 
    • That’s no guarantee, and that lax attitude may put them at risk.
  • Unfortunately, teens don’t fully comprehend the negative impact of identity theft until it is too late. 
  • Identity theft can destroy or damage a teen’s ability to qualify for student loans, acquire a cell phone, seek employment or secure a place to live. 
  • These teens can face a number of roadblocks during an already challenging time of applying to colleges, trying to land jobs and building credit. 
  • These obstacles can take a long time to clear up. 
  • In the meantime, teens could lose out on hitting important milestones and landing the opportunities they deserve.

Red Flags That Your Teen’s Identity Has Been Stolen

  • Some warning signs that your teenager may be a victim of teen identity theft are:
    • They start receiving pre-approved credit card offers and loans in the mail. 
    • They receive a bank statement or credit card statement in your child’s name, and they have no accounts.
    • You receive calls from a collection agency about overdue balances on fraudulent credit file accounts.
    • They apply for a student loan or driver’s license and find out that someone already has one using their social security number.
    • Your child’s credit report shows accounts and a full credit history that does not belong to them. 
    • Your teen is arrested for a crime they never committed.

[AD2: ENTERTAINMENT]

[SEGMENT 3] 

How To Stay Safe from Teen Identity Theft

  • Cleaning up identity theft is much more complicated than preventing it. 
  • Thankfully, there are steps you can take to prevent teen identity theft.
    • Always be sure to be cautious about giving out personal information like your social security number, birth date, bank account details, your home address, phone numbers, or mother’s maiden name.
    • Never download software from untrusted sources.
    • Do not click links in email or text messages. 
      • Visit the website yourself using a clean browser window.
    • Monitor your credit report, you can get a free copy every year.
    • Put a credit freeze on your child’s credit report until they need it. 
      • That way, no one can open new accounts in their name without you thawing it. 
      • Contact each of the credit reporting agencies to do this. 
    • Shred documents with personal information on them before throwing them in the trash.
    • Always use very strong passwords on computers, tablets, and mobile phones.
    • Avoid storing personal information on a cell phone without using a biometric to secure it like FaceID or Fingerprint ID. 
    • Keep computers and mobile devices locked with a PIN.
    • Store your social security card and birth certificate at home in a safe location. 
    • Protect your PIN when entering it at a gas station or ATM. 
    • Never put your social security number on your resume.

What to Do if You Are the Victim of Identity Fraud

  • If you do become the victim of identity fraud, take the steps below as soon as possible.
    • Contact local law enforcement and file a report.
    • Put a fraud alert on your credit report with all three major credit bureaus (Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax).
    • Contact the FTC to file a complaint online or by calling 1-877-438-4338.
    • Review all your bank and credit card accounts and request new cards if anything has been tampered with. 
    • Get a free copy of your credit report every year to review all activity and verify the information.
    • Sign up for credit and identity monitoring to let the experts keep an eye on things for you. 
    • Contact the Identity Theft Resource Center for more help at https://www.idtheftcenter.org/

[TRANSITION]

  • [CLOSE]
    • Closing thoughts shoutouts

[OUTRO AND CREDITS]

Transcription

00;00;01;21 – 00;00;07;24
Narrator
Insightful podcasts. I informative host.

00;00;11;07 – 00;00;16;22
Narrator
Of insights into things.

00;00;18;00 – 00;00;18;23
Narrator
A podcast.

00;00;18;24 – 00;00;19;08
Narrator
Network.

00;00;26;15 – 00;00;42;23
Narrator
Welcome to Insights into Teens, a podcast series exploring the issues and challenges of today’s youth. Your hosts are Joseph and Madison well as a father and daughter team making their way through the challenges of the teenage years.

00;00;51;09 – 00;01;04;18
Joseph
Welcome to insights in the team, this is episode 134 teens and identity theft, I’m your host, Joseph Wayland, and my thoughtful and intelligent co-host Madison Whalen.

00;01;05;01 – 00;01;05;22
Madison
Hi, everyone.

00;01;05;27 – 00;01;06;29
Joseph
How are you doing today, Matty?

00;01;07;12 – 00;01;09;00
Madison
I’m doing all right. How about you?

00;01;09;11 – 00;01;16;11
Joseph
I’m doing OK. How’s school been? I know you’re back to homeschooling this week. How do you handle that?

00;01;16;26 – 00;01;20;15
Madison
Um, I’m handling it pretty well. I would say.

00;01;20;25 – 00;01;23;08
Joseph
Any, any hiccups, any problems.

00;01;23;26 – 00;01;33;00
Madison
And just, I guess in certain classes, that’s not moving along very much because kids don’t want to participate. So.

00;01;33;22 – 00;01;41;09
Joseph
OK, well, we won’t name names or, you know, we’ll protect the innocent and the guilty by not naming names today.

00;01;41;19 – 00;01;42;01
Narrator
Yeah.

00;01;42;10 – 00;02;00;15
Joseph
So today’s topic is kind of a follow up to last week’s podcast. So last week we talked about your digital footprint and how dangerous that could be. And one of the things we kind of mentioned there, we didn’t go into great detail was how it could be used for identity theft.

00;02;01;01 – 00;02;12;12
Joseph
And I kind of thought that that was that was kind of a bigger topic. And identity theft isn’t something that’s just related to teens, it’s related to everyone. So I think a lot of people might get some benefit from this.

00;02;13;09 – 00;02;30;14
Joseph
So today we’re going to talk about what does identity theft? Why do teens have to worry about identity theft? What are some of the red flags of identity theft? How to stay safe from teen identity theft? And what do you do if you think you were a victim of identity theft?

00;02;31;01 – 00;02;40;27
Joseph
Hopefully, it will be another informative and educational one that I might even be another subject matter expert on. Like last week I was, I was pleased by that.

00;02;41;02 – 00;02;41;12
Narrator
Yeah.

00;02;42;02 – 00;03;05;08
Joseph
Before we do that, though, I do want to invite our listening and viewing audience to subscribe to the podcast. You can find audio versions of this podcast listed as insights into teens. VIDEO Versions of All the Networks podcast can be found listed as insights into things or are available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, Stitcher, iHeartRadio pretty much

00;03;05;08 – 00;03;16;26
Joseph
any place you can get a podcast. I would also invite folks to write into us, tell us how we’re doing. Give us your show suggestions. Do you have any questions on the topics that we discuss here? We’re happy to answer them.

00;03;17;19 – 00;03;38;14
Joseph
You can email us at comments and insights into things dot com. You can hit us on Twitter at Twitter. Dot com slash insights underscore things. We’re on Facebook, even though I don’t like it at Facebook dot com slash Insights Into Things podcast or Instagram at Instagram dot com slash insights into things where you get links to all

00;03;38;14 – 00;04;03;05
Joseph
those and more on our official website at WW W Dot Insights into things dot com. Are we ready? Yep. All right, here we go. So what is identity theft? So to these research was from a very comprehensive website called ID Strong dot com.

00;04;04;25 – 00;04;22;13
Joseph
Identity theft is when someone steals your Social Security number, birth date and other identifying information and pretends to be you. So they can apply for credit cards, mortgages, loans or commit other types of fraud, like filing a tax return with the IRS to get a refund.

00;04;23;20 – 00;04;40;01
Joseph
Scammers are often total strangers, but they can also be someone related to you or close friend. Unfortunately, identity theft is very common in children, and teens are often targeted due to the fact that they’re not yet using their credit.

00;04;41;08 – 00;04;53;01
Joseph
No one’s immune from identity theft. Typically, criminals target those who are less likely to be aware of teen identity theft. So criminals can ride the money train for as long as possible.

00;04;54;12 – 00;05;11;06
Madison
So what is to identity theft and how do thieves steal it? So identity theft can happen in various ways. It is the same for teens as adults. Sometimes scammers steal your mail, hack into your computer or mobile devices and steal information that way.

00;05;12;06 – 00;05;31;29
Madison
If teens are included in any data breaches, their information may be compromised. Many schools have been targeted for data breaches lately. A phishing email is another tool used by identity thieves to get an unsuspecting teen to click a link and an information, or unwittingly download meticulous software.

00;05;32;00 – 00;05;32;16
Madison
Right now.

00;05;33;14 – 00;05;34;11
Joseph
Malicious.

00;05;34;22 – 00;05;39;02
Madison
I thought I got it right. Malicious software.

00;05;39;16 – 00;05;41;25
Joseph
Unfortunately, could be meticulously written.

00;05;43;19 – 00;06;00;24
Madison
Unfortunately, due to the fact that a young person’s information can be used for so long. Teens are particularly particularly vulnerable to becoming victims of identity theft. A thief can purchase a child’s Social Security number on the dark Web for about two bucks.

00;06;01;21 – 00;06;18;08
Joseph
So identity theft is something that people need information for. And last week we talked about your digital footprint, which is what your presence is on the internet. And one of the things that we talked about was the fact that people were so willing to share information.

00;06;19;19 – 00;06;35;06
Joseph
And that’s kind of dangerous. So when people steal your identity, they steal from various different locations. So I mean, it could be as simple as someone dumpster diving and going through your trash, you know, to these Wednesday, we put our trash out today.

00;06;35;25 – 00;06;49;12
Joseph
People can go by and take your trash and go through it and look for bills or credit card information. You know, credit card offers stuff like that. And they’ll start to glean information. That’s kind of an old fashioned way of doing it.

00;06;50;18 – 00;06;58;12
Joseph
Another way is to steal your phone if you lose your phone. Kids are losing their phones all the time, right? Have you ever lost your phone?

00;06;59;02 – 00;07;02;08
Madison
Only one specific against at marching band.

00;07;02;24 – 00;07;09;00
Joseph
Right. And we were able to recover it fairly quickly. But is there any personal information on your phone?

00;07;10;22 – 00;07;12;25
Madison
I mean, I guess probably.

00;07;12;26 – 00;07;32;16
Joseph
Yeah, so you probably have information about mommy and daddy, you have contacts in there that could be used for identity theft. The names of your pets could be used. one of the things that’s kind of a security check when you get a credit card or sign up for a web site is they’ll ask you some personal questions

00;07;33;07 – 00;07;47;15
Joseph
and they’ll ask things like What was your first pet’s name or what was your grade school or what was your high school or what street was your school on? And these questions are designed to be answered only by you.

00;07;48;28 – 00;08;09;00
Joseph
So if I ask you, what was your first name, what would you say, why would you tell me we’re on the air on a podcast that you’re going to tell me? See, that’s what I’m saying. That’s an example of the second or the third type of information gathering that’s called social engineering.

00;08;09;25 – 00;08;25;02
Joseph
And this happens a lot. So a lot of times what will happen is it happens more to businesses. So some of your call business up and pretend to be a vendor or a fellow employee or something along those lines and try to get information.

00;08;25;02 – 00;08;36;20
Joseph
Oh, hey, you know, this is so-and-so from accounting and a from it said to give you a call because I was having an issue and you need to give me your password so we can fix something for you.

00;08;37;09 – 00;08;54;29
Joseph
And a lot of times people will give you that information. It’s very easy to manipulate people into giving information because by their very nature, people are trusting in an environment like that. So, you know, your I.T. department, you’re going to have to trust your IT department.

00;08;55;09 – 00;09;08;04
Joseph
Well, I run a 98 department, and the one thing that we do don’t ever do is ask you for your password. And I’ll tell everyone that if we need to get into your account for any reason. And sometimes we do.

00;09;08;05 – 00;09;19;09
Joseph
You could be out sick and we wanted to put it out of office. Message on your email or something will change your password to a temporary one. And then gave you that password, and then you can change it back.

00;09;19;26 – 00;09;35;02
Joseph
I don’t ever want people to give me their passwords. So there’s a lot of different avenues from which you can get information for people, and what happens is they start gathering all this information and they start building a profile or a fingerprint of you.

00;09;35;22 – 00;09;52;12
Joseph
Then they can go and open a credit card account or open up a business loan or something else. But it’s that information that’s really the valuable part of things. Do you think that you’re effectively that you effectively guard your personal information?

00;09;52;20 – 00;10;04;07
Madison
Pretty much. I never give any of my personal information out. In fact, a lot of the personal information I’d probably have is kind of just to be determined stuff, right?

00;10;04;24 – 00;10;21;23
Joseph
Seeing what I’ll do is like if I have a website that’s asking me those personal questions for security, I’ll give them completely different answers that have nothing to do with the questions. And then I’ll record those in for those answers in a password manager that I can secure and encrypt.

00;10;22;16 – 00;10;38;20
Joseph
So if they ask me, you know, what was your first name? I might say blue. You know, as an example. And then I’ll write that down on my my password manager. And then if I have to go to a password recovery again and ask that question, I know what the answer to that question is.

00;10;39;23 – 00;10;57;00
Joseph
So and we talked about fudging your data before, that’s another form of fudging your data where you’re not providing. An anticipated response to your questions. You know, if I ask you what your street address is and you tell me Saturn like, that makes no sense.

00;10;57;24 – 00;11;14;01
Joseph
And oftentimes what happens and they talk about it here that you could buy someone’s Social Security number $2 off the darkweb. And how that works is you get data breaches when you hear about this all the time almost every week as another data breach.

00;11;14;26 – 00;11;37;28
Joseph
And that’s when someone gets into a company’s database and they just download tons and tons of data. Well, sometimes that data just comes across as as raw text, so you don’t know what it is. So you may be looking at that information and seeing the home address or first address, and it’s a Saturday and you’ll look at

00;11;37;29 – 00;11;49;11
Joseph
and say, Well, that doesn’t make any sense, and we’ll just keep on going because it doesn’t, it doesn’t match up. So that’s another reason why you fuzz that data, sort of. It’s not something that’s identifiable to the question to.

00;11;49;20 – 00;12;10;11
Joseph
OK, so it’s just another technique. So we haven’t done this in a while. We’re going to throw some statistics out there because this was a great one of the new statistics law. So. According to a 2018 study, two thirds of all identity theft victims are under the age of 18, which I didn’t know I thought that was

00;12;10;11 – 00;12;11;04
Joseph
remarkable.

00;12;11;12 – 00;12;11;21
Narrator
Mm-Hmm.

00;12;12;13 – 00;12;19;13
Joseph
Roughly 20% are the age are between the ages of eight and twelve. Why don’t you give us the rest of them?

00;12;21;10 – 00;12;39;08
Madison
Children are ripe for this type of fraud, and the experts estimate that 1 million children are victims of identity fraud every year. The losses stemming from identity theft total more than 2.67000000000.

00;12;39;15 – 00;12;40;28
Joseph
That’s something that’s a lot of money.

00;12;41;02 – 00;12;41;24
Narrator
Yeah, that’s a.

00;12;41;24 – 00;12;42;14
Joseph
Lot of money.

00;12;43;06 – 00;13;01;06
Madison
According to the state to the same study. Teens are more at risk after a data breach than adults. The findings showed that 39% of teens were victimized after a data breach, while only 19% of adults were. A Federal Trade Commission.

00;13;01;17 – 00;13;16;06
Madison
The Federal Trade Commission, or FTC, says that 18 to 29 year olds are the group that is most at risk for identity theft. Those 18 and under are becoming a larger target group as well.

00;13;16;28 – 00;13;32;29
Joseph
So they talk about how teens were victimized more often than adults and data breaches. And part of that is because adults tend to be a little bit more in tune with what their credit scores look like. And you know what a credit score is.

00;13;33;07 – 00;13;51;00
Joseph
Yeah. So for the audience to seek credit, there’s three credit bureaus out there, and each of those look at how you spend money and how you take on debt and how you pay it back and so forth. And they produce a credit score so you once a year can go out and get your credit score from each

00;13;51;00 – 00;14;04;04
Joseph
of the credit bureaus and see what shows up on there. So most adults are likely to do that because they’re trying to improve their credit score. They want to get a new car, they want to get a mortgage.

00;14;04;04 – 00;14;23;24
Joseph
They want to get low interest rates on their credit cards, whatever it is. Teens typically aren’t looking at that sort of thing. So as a result, a lot of discrepancies slip through. You may find out that you’re 18 years old and have had a credit card for 15 years, you can look at your your credit statements, your

00;14;24;08 – 00;14;37;11
Joseph
credit reports, which should never have happened, but that’s because of identity theft. So that’s sort of why like and I guess kind of what I’m trying to do here is clue people into the fact that you have to look at this stuff.

00;14;37;11 – 00;14;55;13
Joseph
It’s boring. It’s kind of annoying. It’s out of the way, but there’s a significant impact if you don’t, and it can be very dangerous and very costly. So we’re going to take a quick break. We’re going to come back and we’ll talk about why teens are targeted for identity theft.

00;14;55;14 – 00;14;56;15
Joseph
We’ll be right back.

00;15;05;17 – 00;15;06;16
Narrator
For over seven.

00;15;06;16 – 00;15;31;00
Joseph
Years, the second Sith empire has been the Premiere Community Guild in the online game Star Wars The Old Republic, with hundreds of friendly and helpful active members, a weekly schedule of nightly events, annual guild meet and greets, and an act of community both on the web and on Discord.

00;15;32;03 – 00;15;58;07
Joseph
The second of Empire is more than your typical gaming group. We’re family. Joining us on the star forward server for nightly events such as operations, flashpoints, world boss funds, Star Wars trivia, Old Lottery and much more. Visit us on the Web today at W W W Dot, the second sip.

00;15;58;07 – 00;15;59;29
Narrator
And fire dot com.

00;16;07;07 – 00;16;30;00
Madison
Welcome back to inside 19 today, we’re talking about identity theft, and now we’re going to talk about why are teens targeted for identity theft? So teenagers make great target for scams for a number of reasons. Identity thieves target people who are easiest and who won’t notice the fraud so they can maximize their profits.

00;16;30;16 – 00;16;51;10
Madison
Some reasons that these criminals target teens are online use. Teens spend a large amount of time online signing up for accounts, gaming and communicating on social media. This makes them very visible as targets. Teens routinely divulge personal. That’s how you see it, right?

00;16;51;11 – 00;16;51;28
Joseph
That’s correct.

00;16;52;23 – 00;17;19;08
Madison
Teens routinely divulge personal information, including their home address, phone number or whereabouts through online social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. These status updates are easily searchable and can lead to an identity thief gathering bits of personal data over time, including a teen’s address, phone number or pet’s name, which might just be the answer of a

00;17;19;08 – 00;17;38;25
Madison
security question for an online banking banking account. Online updates about a teen’s whereabouts can also tip off a thief that the individual and hit and his or her family is, say, on vacation together or out of grandmother’s birthday party.

00;17;39;13 – 00;17;45;03
Madison
In other words, the thief suddenly knows that the teen’s home is vacant and can be targeted.

00;17;45;27 – 00;17;52;08
Joseph
And that’s a whole different security concern in and of itself. That’s not identity theft related, but still security related.

00;17;52;13 – 00;17;52;24
Narrator
Yeah.

00;17;54;07 – 00;18;12;26
Joseph
Undetected use. This is what we kind of touched on a little while ago. So teens and their parents rarely check their credit reports as a result. Identity thieves can go months or years without being suspected. In addition, teens credit reports are usually blank slates.

00;18;13;09 – 00;18;31;03
Joseph
They allow thieves easy access to first time credit card offers or loans. Teens won’t start using their credit to take out loans for a while. Therefore, the fraudster can use their identity and reap the benefits, sometimes for years before the damage is detected.

00;18;31;28 – 00;18;39;28
Joseph
Usually, teens realize something’s wrong when they apply for a driver’s license or attend college, and they try to take out school loans.

00;18;41;15 – 00;18;46;15
Madison
So teens have unused social media security, no Social Security numbers.

00;18;46;19 – 00;18;48;20
Joseph
Social media, security numbers, no, I’m.

00;18;48;20 – 00;18;52;05
Madison
Sorry, we didn’t entirely do a full report.

00;18;52;09 – 00;18;53;10
Joseph
We did this.

00;18;53;12 – 00;19;15;27
Madison
So some teens have unused Social Security numbers. These are desirable among identity thieves because an individual can pair them with any name and birthdate and identity thief can then use or sell the Social Security number so that. Someone can obtain a fake I.D. for employment.

00;19;17;03 – 00;19;20;17
Joseph
Correct, written wrong in the notes, well.

00;19;20;22 – 00;19;20;29
Narrator
Read.

00;19;21;00 – 00;19;22;18
Joseph
Correctly, congratulations.

00;19;23;28 – 00;19;46;06
Madison
Also, some teens share breaking share banking info. Teens generally aren’t shy about handing off their credit card number to a friend that is buying group tickets for a basketball game or pre-ordering movie theater passes. This can be problematic if a friend isn’t trustworthy or if someone with ill intentions overhears the exchange of information.

00;19;47;15 – 00;20;08;13
Joseph
Smartphones are frequently misplaced. Teens use their smartphones to transmit and stored troves of personal data. Unfortunately, these devices can be easily lost or stolen and land in the wrong person’s hands. Teens also use public Wi-Fi when teens use public Wi-Fi.

00;20;08;23 – 00;20;30;08
Joseph
It’s easy for an identity thief to obtain personal information that’s being transmitted online. Although teens often view themselves as experts in technology, they should be aware of the fact that hackers and other online predators are often even more advanced and can easily snatch their information.

00;20;30;19 – 00;20;51;20
Joseph
Now it’s it’s it’s worth conveying a story that I have. I had attended a security conference up in North Jersey a couple of years back. It was a giant stadium or what is was giant stadium, I guess. And during the presentation, they brought a white hat hacker out.

00;20;52;08 – 00;21;10;15
Joseph
So not to get too into the weeds here, but you have Black Hat hackers who are unethical hackers, people that break the law and do things that are. Bad and illegal. And then you have white hat hackers who are considered ethical hackers.

00;21;10;15 – 00;21;24;04
Joseph
These are the guys that are the defense against the Black Hat hackers. So they’re the good guys. They work for the FBI and the police and stuff like that. So they started the presentation out with an agent special agent from the FBI.

00;21;24;04 – 00;21;42;12
Joseph
Kind of going over his presentation and up on stage with him happened to be this other individual they hadn’t introduced yet. So when the FBI agent was finished with his presentation, he introduced the other individual as a white hat hacker who the FBI worked with frequently to do data forensics and stuff like that.

00;21;43;07 – 00;22;03;26
Joseph
Well, while he was on stage there, he was actually running a utility on his phone that was identifying everyone else’s phone in the in the presentation there that was in the audience, identifying the vulnerabilities and actually hacking into several of the phones.

00;22;05;02 – 00;22;17;18
Joseph
Me being paranoid as I was the first thing I did when I walk into this presentation is I powered my phone off so that he couldn’t get into my phone. But he had it all on his phone that could do this stuff.

00;22;18;14 – 00;22;37;08
Joseph
And this is really where some of the more sophisticated attacks come from. So when you’re on your phone, at Starbucks or at the library or wherever and you’re on the public Wi-Fi, that public Wi-Fi is not secure and people think that, oh, well, it’s free, it’s fast.

00;22;37;08 – 00;22;55;02
Joseph
I’m going to use that. That’s usually not a good idea because anybody who happens to be on that Wi-Fi, who’s running one of these utilities can access your phone if there are vulnerabilities on there. And again, I’m going to go back to devices that are secure versus devices that are not.

00;22;56;00 – 00;23;12;07
Joseph
So Apple, for instance, pushes their security updates out regularly. Does it matter who your carrier is? Does it matter where you bought your phone from? If you’re running an Apple device and there is a new patch that comes out, the patch is a security hole.

00;23;12;20 – 00;23;32;04
Joseph
You’ll get it within a day or two from Apple automatically. If you’re running Android updates for Android, trickle out slower because Android, you have different versions of Android that are out there, you have different manufacturers and how they handle their updates, your carriers may be pushing your updates out there.

00;23;32;14 – 00;23;51;00
Joseph
So Android devices don’t have the same level of security when it comes to patching things, and the first thing these utilities do is they see who’s on the network. They do a scan because you can send a basically, you can send the query out to see what operating system you’re running and your phone comes back and says

00;23;51;00 – 00;24;05;26
Joseph
, I have this operating system, I have this version, I have this revision and I have this patch level. And if they identify something that has a known exploit, they’ll push a button and they can, in some cases, immediately take control of the phone.

00;24;07;15 – 00;24;22;12
Joseph
That’s how powerful these tools are. But you were never on that Wi-Fi access and you had your Wi-Fi turned off there, they can’t do that because you’re carriers have a more secure way of communicating. So that’s kind of the scary thing about using public Wi-Fi.

00;24;22;21 – 00;24;25;00
Joseph
Hmm. What are some of the other things that we have?

00;24;25;23 – 00;24;43;26
Madison
So teams also use the same password for multiple sites. Well, teams don’t use complex passwords for their online sites or use the same password multiple times. It is easy for a thief to access their accounts. The answers to their security questions might also be easy for others to figure out.

00;24;44;07 – 00;25;02;15
Joseph
Now let me stop you there for a second. one of the things that we’re in the process of doing at my office right now is moving from one password manager to another. The password managers themselves allow you to access all of your passwords from one centralized, encrypted, secure location.

00;25;03;20 – 00;25;18;25
Joseph
The advantage to that is every time you go to set up a website account, your bank account, whatever, you can create a very complex password that you’ll never remember. But you don’t have to because that’s the job of the password manager.

00;25;19;17 – 00;25;36;05
Joseph
As long as you can get into the password manager, remember one complex password? It does the rest of the work for you. A lot of people get in the habit of using simple passwords or passwords that they can remember, and passwords like the first thing they’ll come up with are birthdays.

00;25;36;15 – 00;25;53;23
Joseph
Everyone uses birthdates for everything. So somebody can figure out what your spouse’s birthday is or what your kid’s birthdays are. They’re 70% of the way they’re. The other problem people fall into is they use they reuse the same password over and over and over because they can remember.

00;25;54;12 – 00;26;09;26
Joseph
They may think it’s the most. It could be 50 characters. It could be very complex. But if you use it more than once, all you have to do is compromise it one of those locations. And compromising your password isn’t necessarily about compromising your device or you.

00;26;10;11 – 00;26;24;25
Joseph
It could be about you putting a parent that same password into a site that doesn’t protect your password. Then they get the database from that location, and because you used it at ten other sites, they now have that password that they can access it in ten other locations.

00;26;25;26 – 00;26;37;15
Joseph
So unique passwords, complex passwords managed through a password manager is the best way to go. OK, moving right along.

00;26;39;01 – 00;26;57;24
Madison
Teens also don’t understand identity theft. Teens are often targeted for identity theft because the risk of becoming a victim isn’t on their radar. They don’t always understand that their actions are making them vulnerable and they are unaware of severe of the severe consequences.

00;26;58;13 – 00;27;12;23
Madison
Teens also tend to be on. I’m concerned, unconcerned about identity theft, and don’t worry about the consequences, believing it won’t happen to them. That’s no guarantee, and the lax attitude may put them at risk.

00;27;13;14 – 00;27;32;26
Joseph
Unfortunately, teens don’t fully comprehend the negative impact of identity theft until it’s too late. And it’s not just teens don’t want to pick on teens here. Most adults don’t, either, especially older adults. You know, people that aren’t used to the internet age, and they’re people that are used to going to the bank and talking to a teller

00;27;33;15 – 00;27;51;01
Joseph
. Don’t appreciate the fact that everything that you could do walking into a physical location can now be done from your phone. And, you know, you have older folks who don’t. Really know how to secure their phones, because to them, a phone, it’s for talking to people.

00;27;51;07 – 00;28;08;13
Joseph
They don’t appreciate how powerful smartphones are today. Mm hmm. So that lack of appreciation for what the technology can do, plus the advancements in banking make them very vulnerable to identity theft because they just don’t they don’t put the two together.

00;28;08;25 – 00;28;30;14
Joseph
So it’s not just teens, it’s everybody. Identity theft can destroy or damage a teen’s ability to qualify for student loans, acquire a cell phone, seek employment or secure a place to live. These teens can face a number of roadblocks during an already challenging time of applying to colleges, trying to land jobs and building credit.

00;28;31;18 – 00;28;45;27
Joseph
These obstacles can take a long time to clear up. In the meantime, teens could lose out on hitting important milestones and landing the important opportunities they deserve. But there are some red flags.

00;28;48;02 – 00;29;04;18
Madison
Some warning signs that your teenager may be a victim of teen identity theft. Are they receiving pre-approved credit card offers and loans in the mail? They receive a bank statement or credit card statement and your child’s name, and they have no accounts.

00;29;05;07 – 00;29;26;21
Madison
You receive calls from a collection agency about overdue balances on fraudulent credit file accounts. They apply for a student loan or driver’s license and find out that someone already has one using their Social Security number. Your child’s credit report shows account and a full credit history that does not belong to them.

00;29;27;10 – 00;29;29;26
Madison
Your teen is arrested for a crime they never committed.

00;29;30;03 – 00;29;47;25
Joseph
That sounds like The A-Team, so there are there are red flags out there, and some of these are not as bad as they used to be. You know, one of the things credit card companies used to do ten years, 15 years ago is they’d ship a credit card out to you.

00;29;47;27 – 00;29;59;21
Joseph
It’s pre-approved and you open it up and you rip the sticker off. You call a number, you can activate it. Where you can feel like if you go through the mail, you can feel when there’s a credit card in in an envelope.

00;30;00;10 – 00;30;09;24
Joseph
So what would happen is people would rifle through the mail, they’d feel the credit card, they’d steal it and then they’d activated themselves and they’d run out before you even know you got it. So a lot of credit cards.

00;30;10;11 – 00;30;23;26
Joseph
Credit card companies stopped doing that, which is nice, but yeah, and these are these are. These are the things that you’ll see if you’re not actively looking, because these are the things that the negative things that you’re going to get pinged on.

00;30;24;29 – 00;30;39;03
Joseph
So hopefully before you get to the point that you start seeing some of these red flags, you’ve already started to investigate some of your own credit history. So again, you know, we try to always end on a high note.

00;30;39;07 – 00;30;45;22
Joseph
So it’s not all doom and gloom. When we come back, we’ll talk about how to stay safe from identity theft. We’ll be right back.

00;30;54;16 – 00;31;16;09
Narrator
Insights into entertainment, a podcast series taking a deeper look into entertainment and media. Are husband and wife, team of pop culture fanatics are exploring all things for music and movies to television and fandom. We’ll look at the interesting and obscure entertainment news of the week.

00;31;18;17 – 00;31;36;18
Narrator
We’ll talk about theme park and pop culture news. We’ll give you the latest and greatest on pop culture convention. We’ll give you a deep dove into Disney, Star Wars and much more. Check out our video episodes at youtube.com.

00;31;36;18 – 00;31;48;27
Narrator
Backslash insights into things are audio episodes and podcast insights into entertainment dot com or check us out on the web at insights into things dot com.

00;31;56;08 – 00;32;09;29
Madison
Welcome back to insights in the teens today, we’re talking about identity theft. And right now we’re going to talk about how to stay safe from teen identity theft. So cleaning up identity theft is much more complicated than preventing it.

00;32;10;17 – 00;32;27;15
Madison
Thankfully, there are steps you can take to prevent teen identity theft. one of these is to always be cautious about giving out personal information like your Social Security number birthdate, bank account details, your home address, phone numbers or your mother’s maiden name.

00;32;28;22 – 00;32;32;09
Madison
Also, you should never download software from untrusted sources.

00;32;32;15 – 00;32;34;02
Joseph
Which is always a good idea.

00;32;34;07 – 00;32;34;18
Narrator
Yeah.

00;32;35;14 – 00;32;48;15
Joseph
Before we go on, I did want to give a shout out to a friend of the show in a chat on Twitch right now. Big hello to tough god, Kenny. Now that that part of the business is gone.

00;32;48;25 – 00;32;49;14
Madison
Hi, Kenny.

00;32;49;20 – 00;33;06;07
Joseph
Hi, Kenny. So what else do we have? So we say do not click links in email or text messages. Visit the website yourself using a clean browser window. Monitor your credit report, which we’ve talked about. You can get a free copy every year.

00;33;06;29 – 00;33;24;22
Joseph
Put a freeze on your child’s credit report. This is another thing a lot of people don’t realize is that you can actually put a freeze on your credit. And I was involved. I wasn’t involved, but my information had been compromised in some data breach a while back for a service that I used, and it wasn’t severe.

00;33;24;23 – 00;33;39;21
Joseph
They can get passwords or anything like that. It wasn’t clear text, but the first thing I did was I went to all three of the credit bureaus and put a freeze on my credit. So when you put a freeze on there, you can go to the credit bureaus and basically tell them, don’t approve anything until you hear

00;33;39;21 – 00;33;56;15
Joseph
from me, and they’ll give you a certain security combination that you have to jump through in order to turn it back off. But then if someone tries to open a bank account or a credit card or a loan or anything like that, they have to go to the credit bureaus in order to get approval.

00;33;56;15 – 00;34;08;20
Joseph
And the credit bureaus will report back to whoever’s asking for it and say There’s a freeze on here and this guy can’t have any credit. So that immediately shuts down the ability to to open accounts under your name.

00;34;08;27 – 00;34;09;05
Narrator
Hmm.

00;34;11;03 – 00;34;19;07
Joseph
They also say shred documents with personal information on them before throwing them in the trash, and this prevents the dumpster diving and getting that information out.

00;34;19;08 – 00;34;25;28
Madison
Yeah, it’s kind of just thinking maybe like like my first thought was just burn it, but don’t burn.

00;34;25;28 – 00;34;28;11
Joseph
It. And yeah, probably illegal in many states.

00;34;28;12 – 00;34;29;00
Madison
Just read.

00;34;29;00 – 00;34;42;27
Joseph
It. But we don’t have a shredder here, so I tear all, all that stuff up today. I in fact, I went to the junk mail today and, you know, shredded it pretty good with my hands. So at least do that because then it makes it more difficult.

00;34;43;00 – 00;34;43;28
Joseph
What else do we have?

00;34;44;24 – 00;35;04;08
Madison
We also have always use very strong passwords or computers, tablets and mobile phones, and we kind of already mentioned that one, right? Avoid storing personal information on self on a cell phone without using a biometric to secure it like Face ID or fingerprint ID.

00;35;05;17 – 00;35;23;25
Madison
Keep your computers and mobile devices locked with a pin. Store your Social Security card and birth certificate at home in a safe location. Protect your pin when entering it at a gas station or ATM. Never put your Social Security number on your resume.

00;35;24;12 – 00;35;37;25
Joseph
So there’s a couple of other really good ones they talk about here, and it’s worth kind of expounding on them. So you have a debit card now, so you potentially could be using some of this technology now moving forward?

00;35;38;01 – 00;35;38;11
Narrator
Yeah.

00;35;38;28 – 00;35;57;15
Joseph
And the one thing they talk about about protecting your pin. If you go to a convenience store and a or a bank or so you’ll notice that they have these little covers that that partially obscure the keypads. And the reason for that is so that somebody standing next to you can’t watch you punch the numbers in.

00;35;58;13 – 00;36;15;07
Joseph
But it’s it’s important to be mindful when you are entering that information in. You should always try to obscure it from view from anybody. There could be people with cameras and stuff like that, so always sort of get up on top of that device and punch your number in there so so people can get that.

00;36;18;06 – 00;36;48;14
Joseph
They talk about using Face ID and fingerprint I.D.. From a security standpoint, there’s a huge difference between the security levels there. So and then I’m talking from a legal standpoint, so for instance, the. Legal authorities in the United States at least cannot force you to give them a password, however, they can force you to use biometric technology

00;36;48;14 – 00;37;09;28
Joseph
to unlock your devices. So you’re your face, for instance, they can force you to unlock it with your face or your fingerprint. So using biometrics, while it’s a great second form of authentication. If you’re if you’re if you have incriminated, I want to say incriminating, but you know, you have information on there that you don’t want people

00;37;09;28 – 00;37;28;23
Joseph
to get out of you. Biometrics is not the best way to do it from an intellectual property standpoint. And then the other one they talk about here is never put your Social Security number on a resume. You’d be surprised how few people can legally ask you for your Social Security number.

00;37;29;22 – 00;37;51;14
Joseph
A lot of places treat your Social Security number as though it’s a national I.D. and it’s not. The Social Security number itself can only be asked for tax purposes. So if an employer asks for it, if it literally if anybody asks for it, they’re not using it for tax purposes, you can declined to provide that information.

00;37;52;09 – 00;38;04;14
Joseph
And most people don’t realize they have the right to do that. But so much stuff for identity theft gets tied back to your Social Security number. So you need to be aware of that and be very careful with that.

00;38;05;25 – 00;38;18;11
Joseph
So what do you do if you’re a victim of identity fraud because it still happens despite all the precautions that we take, so you can take some of the steps below. first of all, you contact your local law enforcement and file a report.

00;38;19;03 – 00;38;45;12
Joseph
Most police stations, municipalities all have procedures in place. Some of those procedures, depending on who violates the law, might get elevated up to the FBI. Put a fraud alert on your credit report to three major credit bureaus at Experian, TransUnion and Equifax, now a fraud alert is sort of the next step up above freezing your credit.

00;38;46;15 – 00;39;05;13
Joseph
It includes freezing your credit, but it also includes proactive alerts that go out to banks and so forth that might be reporting on your credit that’s active already. So, for instance, if I have a loan and I’m paying on my loan, the credit bureau gets a report back and forth from the bank that I have the loan

00;39;05;13 – 00;39;23;23
Joseph
on when I have a fraud alert will then alert the bank of this fraud alert so no one else can open. If I have an existing line of credit, they can’t extend it or anything like that. The next one they talk about is to contact the FTC, the Federal Trade Commission, to file a complaint online, or you

00;39;23;23 – 00;39;36;24
Joseph
can call their one 800 number. It’s 18774384338, and that’s to file a formal complaint with the federal government and then they’ll pursue it from there. What else do we have?

00;39;37;10 – 00;39;59;25
Madison
We also have review all your bank and credit card amounts and request new cards if anything has been tampered with. Give a free copy of your credit report every year to review all activity and verify the information. Sign up for credit and identify monitoring to let the experts keep an eye on things for you, as well as

00;39;59;25 – 00;40;08;23
Madison
contact Identity Theft Resource Center for more help at WW W DOD ID Theif Center Dawg.

00;40;09;03 – 00;40;20;13
Joseph
So these are some very common things that we talked about here. There are other defensive things that you can do. one of the things that I do on all my credit cards and most credit card companies will do this now.

00;40;21;25 – 00;40;41;12
Joseph
Is I set up alerts and I say, if anything over a dollar is charged, my credit card, send me an email. And this saved me at one point in time, I was sitting on the couch watching TV at like 9:30 at night, and I got an email alert saying that I had just spent $6 or $6.18 or

00;40;41;12 – 00;40;59;12
Joseph
something at a convenience store that was about 90 miles away from my house. And I immediately knew that it was it was fraudulent. So the first thing I did was I went in, I reported the card itself stolen or duplicated.

00;41;00;11 – 00;41;20;10
Joseph
I, I report it. The transaction is fraud and I put a hold on my credit accounts. And within 15 minutes, my credit card company got back to me and confirmed that it was a it wasn’t. So what they do is when you use a credit card, if you swipe the credit card or you tap it or use

00;41;20;10 – 00;41;41;19
Joseph
any of the automated methods, they get a notification on that transaction that the card itself was physically present. If, for instance, the the cashier has to punch the number in the punch, the number, the expiration and the CV v the security number on there, they get a notification that it was a manual transaction.

00;41;42;09 – 00;41;54;23
Joseph
So my credit card company immediately called me back, said this was a manual transaction. Somebody, you know, got a copy of your credit card number and information. And they they gave me my money back. They canceled the card and sent me a new card.

00;41;55;18 – 00;42;10;25
Joseph
So having those alerts is important. The other one that you can know is most bank accounts now give you your credit scores, not a credit report, but it’s a credit score. And most of those credit scores come with a justification for the score.

00;42;11;16 – 00;42;24;05
Joseph
And that’s usually something that will tell you, you know, how much credit you have, what account you have open, and a lot of details about that. Using that will tell you if you have accounts open that you’re not aware of.

00;42;25;25 – 00;42;39;19
Joseph
So contact your bank, find out what services your bank can provide for you, what kind of identity theft services they have. A lot of banks now will offer identity theft service as a complimentary service to your account information.

00;42;40;11 – 00;43;00;21
Joseph
So there’s a lot of lot of tools in the toolbox that you can use now that can help you protect yourself, that can help you resolve these things. But the government is aware of these now. The the identity theft ten years ago was much more difficult to combat because the federal government didn’t have these programs in place

00;43;00;21 – 00;43;13;19
Joseph
, and a lot of times they they thought people were scamming them and they thought they were just trying to get out of their debt. Stuff like that. Unfortunately, because it’s gotten so bad, the federal government has not put a lot of these things in place down to protect you.

00;43;14;14 – 00;43;30;17
Joseph
But teens are susceptible. They don’t use their credit. And you got to have to keep going to keep an eye on it. So we’ll be right back with your closing remarks. Go for your closing thoughts.

00;43;30;23 – 00;43;50;25
Madison
All right. So to everyone out there, I just wanted to stress how important it is for everyone to make sure that your information is safe, you’re not giving anything out that could potentially cause you to have your identity taken.

00;43;51;23 – 00;44;20;18
Madison
You know, the whole thing about identity theft, and basically, I would definitely recommend to try out as many of these ways that we’ve given to protect. So, you know, protect your credit and so that you know, you’re not charged in, you’re not charged and people can steal your information and, you know, do some research of your own

00;44;20;18 – 00;44;22;22
Madison
and find other ways to help.

00;44;23;04 – 00;44;39;23
Joseph
Okay, sage advice. As always, thank you. I think we’ve we’ve kind of beaten the digital security monster down for a little bit here. I think we’re good right now. Next week, I think we’re going to be back talking about dealing with class clowns, right?

00;44;39;27 – 00;45;00;03
Joseph
Yeah, that’s one that you brought up. Yup. We’ll have that for next week. In the meantime, I want to once again invite our listening and viewing audience to subscribe to the podcast. You can find the audio versions listed as insights into teens, the video versions of all of our podcasts, our listeners insights and the things we’re available

00;45;00;03 – 00;45;20;26
Joseph
on. Pandora, Castro, Stitcher. I do want to also give a shout out to Amazon Music. I had a nice reach out from an agent from Amazon with some hints for helping us to promote the podcast, so she was kind enough to inform me that we are officially listed on Amazon Music now.

00;45;21;25 – 00;45;38;18
Joseph
I would also invite you to write in, give us your feedback, tell us how we’re doing, give a show suggestions. You can email us at comments and insights into things dot com. You can see a streaming five days a week on Twitch, at which Dot TV’s slash insights into things.

00;45;38;18 – 00;45;53;10
Joseph
If you are an Amazon Prime subscriber, you do get a free Twitch Prime subscription. We’d appreciate it. If you’re through that our way, it helps pay the bills. Audio versions of this podcast can be found. A podcast insight into Teens dot com.

00;45;54;05 – 00;46;07;18
Joseph
VIDEO Versions of this podcast can be found at podcast on insights into things dot com, where you can find links to all these and more on our website at WW w done insights into things dot com and you.

00;46;07;24 – 00;46;17;08
Madison
And don’t forget to check out our other two podcasts and and entertainment hosted by you and Mommy. And I don’t know tomorrow our monthly podcast hosted by you and my brother, Sam.

00;46;17;12 – 00;46;20;20
Joseph
And that’s it. Number one in the box for everyone. By.