Word: credit-card
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...good news is that there are plenty of steps you can take. Most credit thieves are opportunists, not well-organized gangs. A lot of them go Dumpster diving for those millions of "pre-approved" credit-card mailings that go out every day. Others steal wallets and return them, taking only a Social Security number. Shredding your junk mail and leaving your Social Security card at home can save a lot of agony later...
Given the resistance to tax increases, look for states to raise revenue with sneaky fees and by further targeting such "sins" as alcohol, gambling and tobacco. In Virginia the DMV levies a service charge on credit-card payments. California is expected to triple motor-vehicle--license fees, adding nearly $4 billion a year to the state's coffers. Higher income taxes for the wealthiest Californians are a possibility too, according to Democratic state senator John Burton. In New York City, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is weighing a surtax on those who earn more than $200,000 a year...
...your next vacation? A growing number of Americans are going online for help, starting a website at which they beg total strangers to fund their cause. Internet panhandling got national attention last June, when Karyn Bosnak, an out-of-work TV executive who had racked up $20,000 in credit-card debt, posted the site savekaryn.com to help pay off her Bergdorf's, Prada and Gucci bills. "Nothing is really in it for you," she wrote. "But I do believe ... if you help me, then someday someone might help you." It worked. Spurred by stories on the Today show...
...good news is that there are plenty of steps you can take. Most credit thieves are opportunists, not well-organized gangs. A lot of them go dumpster diving for those millions of "pre-approved" credit-card mailings that go out every day. Others steal wallets and return them, taking only a Social Security number. Shredding your junk mail and leaving your Social Security card at home can save a lot of agony later...
...need for heightened database security has been exposed repeatedly, thanks to high-profile thefts of sensitive information. These include the raiding of CD Universe's customer credit-card database in 2000 or the pilfering that year of patients' records from the University of Washington Medical Center. Visa and MasterCard have released guidelines to member banks and online merchants on measures each credit-card company expects them to take to protect card numbers. Congress, meanwhile, has passed laws demanding that financial institutions and health-care companies protect customer information...