LifeLock Blog

In Antioch Illinois a man of Matthew Yucus, 20 year-old,  has been accused of stealing a woman’s credit card after she left it in a local Walgreens. The woman realized her mistake and went back to the store only to find that the card was gone. She imminently called the credit card company and the police.

The same day she realized by the time she had canceled her credit card Yucus had already made $279.32  charges to the card at an Antioch Wal-Mart and a local gas station. The police were able to get video surveillance from both the Wal-mart and gas station. They were able to develop a wanted poster for the perp which led to his arrest.

Matthew Yucus was spotted by a cop at a Mcdonald’s that recognize him form the posters and video tape. Another cop joined him and they waited for the man to leave the restaurant. They later pulled him over for running a stop sign and arrested him. Yucus was charged with nine counts of unlawful use of a credit card, six counts of identity theft and felony theft, police said. He was being held on $10,000 bond.

Chief Craig Somerville says “This is the type of opportunity crime which we see increase around the holidays. The victim in this case did a great job of calling the police immediately and contacting her credit card company without delay,”

I still can’t believe they caught the guy. I mean there has to be several instances of this kind of identity theft everyday in any good size town. Makes you wonder who this lady was that the police spent so much time trying to catch the thief. Video surveillance and wanted posters all for some kid that lifted a credit card from an absent minded lady who left it at a Walgreens. Don’t get me wrong it’s great that they caught them just unusual.

More and more states around the US have began using facial recognition systems to prevent identity thieves from apply for more than one driver’s licenses. A drivers license in the identity theft victims name is paramount to identity thieves to getting as much money from them as possible. If they can’t identify themselves as that person they run the risk of exposing themselves. When the government can’t tell the difference between the thief and victim that’s when identity thieves really have a hold on you. Preventing thieves from obtaining a fraudulent drivers license is essential to stopping identity theft.

The facial recognition system works by comparing applicants features in the photo taken at the  DMV to ones already in the Department of Licensing database system. The system uses features like the distance between your eyes among other things to identify possible matches. If an identity theft tries to obtain a drivers license in someone else’s name their duplicate recorded should surface.

The system isn’t perfect and because it’s not an exact science isn’t fool proof, but it is catching people. The new system in Washington State catches 10 duplicates every day. That’s not bad especially for a new system. The system also slows down the process of applying for a drivers license. Some states issue a temporary license, while others simply make you wait until the license has been processed.

It’s a good thing to see state and local governments doing their part to prevent identity theft. I feel this is a good step in the right direction as more and more states are implementing these facial recognition systems as they are proving to be useful and successful.

You would think people would learn that you shouldn’t click on everything you see on the internet and on Facebook, but we constantly see people who refuse to learn this lesson. If people were smart enough not to fall for these tricks hackers would move on to something else. Another Facebook scam similar to all the others is using the super popular pop star Justin Bieber as it’s bait.

The malware works like most of the other on Facebook that make it through Facebook’s filters. There’s some kind of link that has eye catching title in this case “OH MY GOD!…Justin BIEBER Hits Girl For NO Reason! OMG! This Is So Badd!” When people click on it they are taken to a page that has a picture of a girl next to the Fox logo and a big invitation to “click here.” When you do you have to approve an application and will out a information forum. While you are filling out the forum the application is sending altered versions of the scam to your friends and to your wall.

The scam is all too familiar and should be to pretty much any Facebook user by now. The information gained form the users profile and form is used to make money for the creators of the Facebook malware. Who knows what they do with the information you gave them, perhaps could be used to steal someone’s identity, but you can’t assume it’s for anything productive.

If you have fallen for one of these Facebook malwares make sure to remove the application from the Applications and Websites page under Privacy Settings. This will prevent it from further spreading itself to your friends.