McAfee Inc., Santa Clara, Calif., has announced that its next generation of security service suites addresses consumer concerns about ID theft and social engineering attacks, like spyware and spam.
McAfee Internet Security Suite and McAfee Total Protection offer ID theft protection to help prevent scams that identity thieves use, the company claims. All new McAfee products include McAfee SiteAdvisor, which warns consumers about potentially dangerous sites that have engaged in so-called social engineering attacks, such as spyware, adware, spam, browser attacks and online scams.
The company’s SystemGuards monitors users’ PCs for specific behaviors that might signal virus, spyware or hacker activity, while McAfee X-ray for Windows detects and kills rootkits.
Also among the new offerings is McAfee Shredder, which allows users to digitally "shred" confidential files, virtually removing all traces from their PCs, according to the company. McAfee offers its products on a subscription basis, which includes automatic updates, at www.mcafee.com.
Ohio Launches New Weapon in Fight Against ID Theft
The Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) has launched a new Web site that is designed to help drivers discover if someone else has used their personal information to obtain a fraudulent driver’s license.
Ohioans can visit www.ohiobmv.com and click on the "Online Services" link on the menu on the left of the homepage. On the next screen, users select the button that reads, "Verify the most recent date a driver license was issued in your name" and provide the information requested.
"This Web site is intended to fight the large-scale identity theft cases in which a person’s entire identity is appropriated and used fraudulently," Franklin R. Caltrider, registrar of motor vehicles, says in a press release from the BMV. "The reliance on a driver’s license as a form of identification means that a criminal who obtains another person’s license number and Social Security number can do incredible damage to their victim’s credit and reputation."
Ohioans who discover that a license has been issued more recently than the one in their possession could possibly be victims of ID theft and are advised to contact the BMV at (614) 752-7500 to investigate the issuances.
Divine Intervention
An angel is looking out for potential ID theft victims online.
Carnegie Mellon’s Data Privacy Lab has launched "Identity Angel," a program that searches the Internet looking for the names, dates of birth and Social Security numbers of individuals that can be combined to steal their identities.
When Identity Angel encounters such information, it e-mails the individual at risk, providing tips on how to go about remedying the situation.
Identity Angel, which was launched Aug. 7, is the brainchild of Carnegie Mellon’s Dr. Latanya Sweeney. On NPR’s "All Things Considered," Sweeney said Identity Angel identified more than 5,000 individuals who were at risk for identity theft during its initial launch. "We had to stop because we have to be able to control the volume of e-mail that goes out so that we can be very responsive to those people who have inquiries," she said.
Sweeney said much of the personal information is coming from resumes posted online.
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