I received an email last night from a well-known TV anchor wanting my input on a new Facebook issue.  He’d read that when calling Facebook Headquarters, the automated attendant comes on and gives you options to reach each department, and the second option was to press 2 for “law enforcement.”

It could seem odd to many, but it’s true. If you call the Facebook Headquarters (650-543-4800) and reach the switchboard, the 1st option is “For customer support, press 1″ and the second option is “For law enforcement, press 2″. Law enforcement comes ahead of business development, marketing, press, and employment verification in the list of options.When you press 2, the next message says: “This message is only for members of law enforcement. Please note that due to a very large volume of incoming calls, the current call back time is two to four business days. For a faster response, please leave your work authorized email address… A member of Facebook’s security team will email in a timely manner.” Which means that Facebook is very busy fielding calls from law enforcement.

The anchor, and the rest of us, want to know why!

Facebook receives all kinds of requests by law enforcement, as it is essentially a diary of each and every user. Don’t confuse it with a typical diary of the pre Web 2.0 era. The modern diary (or dossier, as I more commonly refer to social networking profiles) is a photo journal, video log, friendship org chart, location status, written history, browsing analyzer, that is so effective because it can be so addictive. In other words, the Facebook activity of an average user  is a digital representation of  that user’s identity. So, to net it out, here several reasons law enforcement officers call Facebook:

• Tracking listed sex offenders for inappropriate use of the Internet
• Civil dispute subpoenas (domestic cases, child custody, harassment, etc.)
• Evidence used in the discovery process (establishing intent, state of mind, relationships, etc.)
• Cases of libel or defamation
• Terrorist activity tracking and fundraising
• Background checks for local, regional and federal governmental positions
• Background checks on potential jurors (see tomorrow’s story about a juror who was dismissed because of a Facebook post)

This is a fascinating and under-reported aspect of social networks – they are providing an open book on people (for good and evil) that used to take investigators (and scammers) weeks or months to collect. All you really need is a subpoena, or to friend the person on whom you are collecting data.

John Sileo became one of America’s leading Social Networking Security Speakers. You can learn more about Facebook Safety and how to protect yourself online here. His clients include the Department of Defense, Pfizer and the FDIC. To learn more about having him speak at your next meeting or conference, contact him by email or on 800.258.8076.

Related posts:

1. How to Disable Facebook Places
2. Facebook Hits 500 Million Users: 3rd Largest Country
3. Why Facebook Privacy Settings Don’t Matter

• Help people share where they are in a social context
• See which friends are near by
• Discover nearby places and new places through friends’ profiles

But, by default, it also allows your friends to tag and publicize your location for you. It’s like being tagged in a photo, except the other person gets to share your location instead of your picture (even if you don’t want others to know where you are, and even if you are not there).

Here are some of the rarely discussed ways that Facebook Places will be used (now or in the future) that you might want to think about before checking in:

1. Facebook will sell (share) your current location and profile to stores in your vicinity so that they can server you hyper-targeted advertising (e.g., here’s a coupon for the store you are about to enter).
2. Friends who aren’t actually your friends will be able to check you in to questionable Places even when you are not there (the practical jokes for the Check Friends In feature are limitless)
3. Facebook will compile and analyze your Places and then sell this profile to companies that would like to have you as a customer. If you “check in” frequently while in Casinos, get ready for a healthy dose of advertising from Bally’s.
4. Thieves will track your location to know the best time to rob your home. It happens every day.
5. Your suspicious spouse or boss will have a handy tool to track your whereabouts when you’d rather keep it private (this could actually be seen as a positive use of Places).
6. The police will be able to subpoena records of your location at the time of a crime (again, if you have done nothing wrong and can prove it, this is a great way for law enforcement to establish location).

The solution isn’t to completely avoid all use of places. It’s to customize your Facebook Places Privacy Settings so that you are in control of the flow of data.

Social Networking Safety Speaker John Sileo

Related posts:

1. How to Disable Facebook Places
2. A Facebook Privacy Tool, Finally
3. Facebook Announces New Privacy Settings

“The Study found that the nation’s 50 top websites on average installed 64 pieces of tracking technology onto the computers of visitors, usually with no warning… the Journal found new tools that scan in real time what people are doing on a Web page, then instantly assess location, income, shopping interests and even medical conditions. These profiles of individuals, constantly refreshed, are bought and sold on stock-market like exchanges.”

The tracking software records and analyzes your browsing patterns. It knows if you’re surfing porn sites, researching bipolar disorder or watching teen movie trailers. With startling accuracy, it interpret’s these patterns and sells the information to websites, sometimes within seconds, that want access to your wallet. What’s the big deal, you ask? Why not let them market to us in highly targeted ways?

That seems reasonable, within limits. According to John Sileo, Identity Theft Expert and author of the newly released book on information survival, Privacy Means Profit, “We are all slowly being boiled like frogs. This month, Big Brother knows which movies I ‘Like’,  what keywords I typed into Google and what books I checked out at the library. Next month they’ll attach our name, address and credit profile to the database so that they can instantly evaluate whether I should be their customer. Because they erode our privacy over time, we don’t notice that we’re being boiled alive!”

According to the Journal, if the tracking software estimates that you are a low income individual, you will likely be shown a higher interest rate credit card when you visit the Capital One website. If you’ve been researching bipolar disorder on Dictionary.com (which downloads 234 tracking programs onto your computer without alerting you), the next insurance website you visit might no longer have a policy that fits you. In another example listed in the article, banks are beginning to consider looking at the credit worthiness of your social networking friends to determine your credit worthiness.

“We can’t just blame this on the businesses that want to market to us,” says Sileo. “They exist to make money and strive to advertise to us in the best way possible. But we don’t have to just sit around and give away all of our precious information.” Sileo recommends a handful of steps we can take to keep our selves out of the hot water, including:

• Delete the cache of tracking cookies on your computer that share information without your consent
• Customize the privacy settings in your browser to minimize information leakage and to regularly delete tracking software like cookies
• Use the “Private Browsing” feature in Safari, Firefox and IE when you don’t want your browsing history stored on your computer
• Lock down your social networking profiles so that marketing companies can’t skim your personal information
• Consider using anonymizing software like the Tor Project, Abine or Better Privacy
• Understand that when you are on the Internet, you are being tracked, and surf accordingly

John Sileo’s identity was used to commit a series of felonies and steal more than $300,000 from his business customers.

His story and how you can avoid the same are detailed in his new book, Privacy Means Profit (Wiley, August 2010).

John speaks professionally to organizations that want to protect their profits against identity theft, social media exposure and corporate espionage. His recent clients include the Department of Defense, FDIC, FTC and Pfizer.

Learn more at ThinkLikeASpy.com.

Related posts:

1. Cybercrime on the Rise: Reported Losses over $550 million!
2. A Facebook Privacy Tool, Finally

During a recent 60 Minutes interview, I was asked off camera to name the Achilles’ heel of an entire country’s data security perspective; what exactly were the country’s greatest weaknesses. The country happened to be New Zealand, a forward-thinking nation smart enough to take preventative steps to avoid the identity theft problems we face in the States. The question was revealing, as was the metaphor they applied to the discussion.

Achilles, an ancient Greek superhero — half human, half god — was in the business of war. His only human quality (and therefore his only exploitable weakness) was his heel, which when pierced by a Trojan arrow brought Achilles to the ground, defeated. From this Greek myth, the Achilles’ Heel has come to symbolize a deadly weakness in spite of overall strength; a weakness that can potentially lead to downfall. As I formulated my thoughts in regard to New Zealand, I realized that the same weaknesses are almost universal — applying equally well to nations, corporations and individuals.

For starters, let’s assume your business is strong, maybe even profitable in these tough economic times. In the spirit of Sun Tzu and The Art of War, you’ve dug in your forces, preparing for a lengthy battle: you’ve reduced costs, maximized your workforce, and focused on your most profitable strategies. As your competitors suffocate under market pressure, you breathe stronger as a result of the exercise. But like Achilles, your survival through adversity blinds you and even conditions you to ignore pending threats. You begin to think that your overall strength translates into an absence of weaknesses; and in general, you might be right. But Achilles didn’t die because of his overall strength, which was significant; he died because he ignored critical details. What details are you and your company ignoring?

Information, like Achilles himself, is power. And maintaining control and ownership of your information is quite possibly the most threatening Achilles’ heel any data-reliant business faces. Companies that don’t actively take control of their data are prime targets for identity theft, social engineering, data breach, corporate espionage, and social media exploitation. Regardless of your title, you have a great deal to learn from Achilles’ mistakes, and a significant opportunity to protect your own corporate heel.

Achilles 3 Fatal Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Admit Your Vulnerabilities. Achilles forgot that he was human, failing to take inventory of his weakness in spite of superior strength. Though his faults were limited — a small tendon at the base of his foot — his failure to protect himself in the right spots proved fatal. When protecting data, it is imperative to understand that your greatest vulnerabilities lie with the people inside of your company. No matter how secure your computer systems, no matter how much physical security you deploy, humans will always be your weakest link. The more technological security you implement, the quicker data thieves will be to attempt to socially engineer those inside your company (or pose as an insider) to capture your data. Admitting vulnerabilities doesn’t have to be a public, embarrassing act. It can be as simple as a quiet conversation with yourself and key players about where your business is ignoring risk.

The three greatest human vulnerabilities tend to be: 1. Unawareness of the risks posed by data loss, 2. Lack of emotional connection to the importance of data privacy (personally in professionally) and it’s affect on profitability, and 3. Misunderstanding that in a world where information is power, it’s no longer about whom you trust, but how you trust. These symptoms suggest that your privacy training has either been non-existent or dry, overly technical, policy related and lacking a strong “what’s-in-it-for-me” link between the individuals in your organization and the data they protect every day.

If this is true inside of your business, rethink your training from this perspective: Your audience members (employees) are individuals with their own identity concerns, not just assets of the company who can be forced to follow a privacy policy that they don’t even pretend to understand. By tapping into their personal vulnerabilities regarding private information (protecting their own Social Security Number, etc.), you can develop a framework and a language for training them to protect sensitive corporate information. Like in martial arts, where you channel your opponent’s energy to your favor, use your employee’s humanness to your advantage. Pinpoint these vulnerabilities and shine the light of education on them.

Fight Prevention Paralysis. One of the most unfortunate and destructive character traits among humans is our hesitation to prevent problems. It is human nature to invest time to prevent tragedy only after we’ve experienced the pain that results from inaction. We hop on the treadmill and order from the healthy menu only after our heart screams for attention. We install a home security system only after we’ve been robbed. Pain motivates action, but the damage is usually done. You can bet that had he the chance to do it all over again, Achilles would slap a piece of armor around his heel (just like TJMAXX would encrypt their wireless networks and AT&T would secure their iPad data).

Prevention doesn’t get the proper attention because its connection to the bottom line is initially harder to see. You are, in essence, eliminating a cost to your business that doesn’t yet exist (the costs of a future data breach: restoring and monitoring customer credit, brand damage, stock depreciation, legal costs, etc.). This seems counterintuitive when you could be eliminating costs that already exist. But here is the flaw in that method of thinking: the cost of prevention is a tiny fraction of the cost of recovery. When you prevent disaster, you get a huge return on your investment (should a breach ever occur). Statistics say that a breach will occur inside of your organization, which means that by failing to invest in prevention you are consciously denying your organization a highly profitable investment. Why would you insure your business against low percentage risks (fire), but turn the other way when confronted with a risk that has already affected 80% of businesses (data breach) and has an almost guaranteed double digit ROI? It is your responsibility to demonstrate how the numbers work; spend small amounts of money preventing, or vast sums of time and money recovering.

Harden the Riskiest Targets. Once you have admitted to and cataloged your vulnerabilities and allocated the resources to protect them, it is time to focus on those solutions with the greatest return on your investment. A constant problem in business is knowing how to see clearly through information overexposure and pick the right projects. Just think of how much stronger Achilles would have been had he placed armor over his heel (which was human) rather than his chest (which was immortal). There is no financially responsible way to lower your risk to zero, so you have to make the right choices. Most businesses will gain the greatest security by focusing on the following targets first:

1. Bulletproof Your People. Most fraud is still committed the old fashioned way – by manipulating trusting, unsuspecting people inside of your organization. Train your people for what they are: the first line of defense against fraud. Begin by preventing identity theft among your staff and then bridge this personal knowledge into the world of professional data privacy.
2. Protect Your Mobile Data. Laptops, smart phones and portable drives are the most common sources of severe data theft. The solution to this very powerful and ubiquitous form of computing is a quilt-work of security including password strengthening, data transport limitations,  access-level privileges, whole disk and wireless encryption, VPN and firewall configuration, physical locking and human decision making (e.g., don’t leave it unattended the next time you get coffee at your corporate conference).
3. Prevent Insider Theft: Perform thorough background checks, reference verification and personality assessment to weed out dishonest employees before they join your organization. Implement an ongoing “honesty meter” for your employees that ensures they haven’t picked up bad or illegal habits since joining your company.
4. Classify Your Data. Develop a system of classification that includes public, internal, confidential and top secret levels, along with secure destruction and storage guidelines.
5. Anticipate the Clouds. Cloud computing (when you store your data on other people’s servers), is quickly becoming a major threat to the security of organizational data. Whether an employee is posting sensitive corporate info on their Facebook page (which Facebook has the right to distribute as they see fit) or you are storing customer data in a poorly protected, non-compliant server farm, you will ultimately be held responsible when that data is breached. You must be aware of who owns that data, today and in the future, when your storage company is bought out or goes bankrupt.

We have much to learn from the foresight of New Zealand; they are an excellent example of how organizations should defend their Achilles’ heel. To begin with, they have begun to acknowledge their vulnerabilities in advance of the problem (in fact, their chief vulnerability is that dangerous form of innocence that comes from having very few data theft issues, so far). In addition, they are taking steps to proactively prevent the expansion of identity theft and data breach in their domain (as evidenced by the corresponding educational story on 60 Minutes). Finally, they are targeting solutions that cost less and deliver more value. I was in New Zealand to instruct them on data security. Ironically, I gained as much knowledge on my area of expertise from them as I believe they did from me.

John Sileo speaks professionally on identity theft, data breach and social networking safety. His clients include the Department of Defense, the FDIC, FTC, Pfizer and the Federal Reserve Bank. Learn more about his Privacy Survival Boot Camp or bring him in to motivate your organization to better protect information assets.

Related posts:

1. Protect Yourself Against Mail Fraud
2. Uncovering Business Identity Theft
3. Privacy Means Profit: Lock Your Business Docs

“Nothing is more important to us than the well-being of the people, especially the many teenagers, who use Facebook,” said Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s chief operating officer.

Facebook is the number one social media site with over 500 million users and a minimum age requirement of 13. Even that requirement can be easily fudged because Facebook has no way of verifying a user’s age besides asking for their birth date when they register. Parents are having trouble deciding whether to let their children join Facebook prematurely and what they should be cautious of if they do so.

Learn more on Protecting Your Children Online.

It is important to be educated when dealing with any form of social media or social networking website. Social networking is immensely powerful and is here for the long run, but we must learn to harness and control it. You should know the ins and outs, pros and cons, risks and rewards to using these online tools. Because teens and children don’t necessarily have the life experiences to recognize the risks, parents must educate themselves and pass that knowledge on with open and honest discussions on Facebook and Online Safety.

John Sileo became one of America’s leading Social Networking Speakers & sought after Identity Theft Experts after he lost his business and more than $300,000 to identity theft and data breach. His clients include the Department of Defense, Pfizer and the FDIC. To learn more about having him speak at your next meeting or conference, contact him by email or on 800.258.8076.

Related posts:

1. Online Safety: The Truth About Social Media Identity Theft
2. Is Online Banking Safe from Identity Theft?
3. Facebook Safety Survival Guide

Facebook Safety
Survival Guide

Includes the

Parents’ Guide to Online Safety

Order your copy Today to get our special introductory pricing of $12.95 or order the Ebook below for only $8.95 !

There is no final word on how to use Facebook safely. Here’s why: social networking and the web change too quickly. The social network you use today is not the same one you will use tomorrow or next month. The privacy settings, functionality, connectability and features are constantly evolving, which means that almost no one has a handle on every aspect of this topic. Those who tell you that they have the final answer are probably selling you something you shouldn’t buy.

This Survival Guide is an evolving document that I started writing for my young daughters and my employees, and is an attempt to give you a snapshot of some of the safety and privacy issues as they exist right now. Social networking, texting, instant messaging, video messaging, blogging – these are all amazing tools that our kids and employees use natively, as part of their everyday lives. In fact, they probably understand social networking better than most adults and executives. But they don’t necessarily have the life experiences to recognize the risks. I’d like to make their online vigilance and discretion just as native, so that they learn to protect the personal information they put on the web before it becomes a problem. Social networking is immensely powerful and is here for the long run, but we must learn to harness and control it.

So whether you are reading this to help protect your own online presence, or the reputation and sensitive data inside of your business, or to bulletproof your kids from some of the harmful forces on the web, the Facebook Safety Survival Guide should get you started.

This Facebook Safety Guide includes:

• Action Item Checklist for Facebook Safety
• Action Item Checklist for Parents’ Guide to Online Safety

Part I: Facebook Safety Survival Guide

• Protecting People We Care About
• Social Networking’s Secret Weapon: Trust
• Fifteen Hazards of Social Networking
• Fifteen Steps to Safer Facebooking
• 10 Types of Information to Keep Private
• Customize Your Privacy Settings: Control Who Can See Your Personal Information & A Tool to Test Your Facebook Privacy
• How Do I Delete My Facebook Account?
• How To Deactivate Your Facebook Account
• How To Delete Your Facebook Account

Part II: Parents’ Guide to Online Safety

• Socializing Online: Sexting & Cyberbullying
• Communicating Online & Phishing
• Mobile Phones: Socializing and Communicating on the Go & Texting
• Protect Your Computers: P2P File Sharing & Parental Controls

© Copyright 2010 John D. Sileo All Rights Reserved

John Sileo became one of America’s leading Social Networking Speakers & sought after Identity Theft Experts after he lost his business and more than $300,000 to identity theft and data breach. His clients include the Department of Defense, Pfizer and the FDIC. To learn more about having him speak at your next meeting or conference, contact him by email or on 800.258.8076.

Related posts:

1. Online Safety: The Truth About Social Media Identity Theft
2. Are Your Kids Safe Online?
3. Facebook Safety Tips to Stop Social Networking Hangovers

One concern that carries over from previous iPhone models is the Always-on iPhone Apps that track your every move through the GPS navigation system. Back in April, Apple began allowing location-tracking applications to run in the background.  So, for example, companies like FourSquare, Yelp, and Facebook can continuously track your location, providing automatic notifications  to your friends when you are less than 1/2 mile away from them, if you allow them.

For example, I just had a highly confidential client meeting at the client’s corporate headquarters. To the  uninitiated, that means that the company I was visiting is probably having data theft issues (and has brought me in to help). If the media finds out that they are having these issues before the company has had a chance to start the damage control process, their stock will drop far faster than if they have prepared for the news to go public. If Facebook or FourSquare is broadcasting my whereabouts, my followers already know which company is having the problem, their competitors know it (if they are following my GPS broadcasts), and the media sits and waits for me to enter the building. Luckily, I’m not well-known enough for anyone to care, but just in case, I don’t broadcast my whereabouts. Other, far more influential people, do so without thinking twice about it. Which goes to show you that there are ways to utilize all of the cool new technology without letting it control you. With the right knowledge, you can take control of how your information is utilized.

Apple does realize the privacy concerns with location tracking and gives users a way to control how much information is shared.  When you open an app, the top bar will show a little arrow in the right-hand corner, indicating location awareness (pictured to the right). There will also be a dashboard where you can toggle location-tracking permissions on and off for different apps. Regardless, this means that more companies will have access you your location than before.

High-definition video is a second tool that will be used by data spies. What could be easier than for an identity thief to pretend they are on the phone as they are actually filming you typing in your ATM PIN in front of them? Why does iPhone 4 change the game? Because Hi-definition means that they can stand further away and still get high quality video with which to read your data. A simple sweep of an office desk, a client file, etc. with high definition video gives me all of the documents I need to learn more about your company. Think of it as a spy camera that provides thousands of pictures a minute and is hidden as the most ubiquitous device on the planet – a cell phone. It’s a powerful tool both for good and bad.

There is no silver bullet solution to the new problems posed by GPS and Hi-Def video. As we teach in our Privacy Survival Boot Camps, what is required is an integrated privacy plan that implements some of the following steps:

• Social Networking and GPS proper usage guidelines to make users aware of the consequences of their actions using these tools
• Classification systems and clean-desk policies (so that a confidential document isn’t left out on the desktop to be filmed in the first place)
• Access privileges (to keep non-authorized personnel from accessing sensitive areas)
• Employee fraud training (to make everyone in the company aware of these issues and give them more detailed tools to protect themselves and the company)

The iPhone 4 is a wonderful business tool that will drastically increase the productivity and connectivity of the workforce. But like any powerful tool, it can be used for dishonest purposes. The first step is to educate yourself and your staff on how these tools can be used, for good or evil.

John Sileo is the award-winning author of Stolen Lives and Privacy Means Profit (Wiley, August 2010), a professional Financial Speaker and America’s leading identity theft expert. His clients include the Department of Defense, FTC, FDIC and Pfizer; his recent media appearances include 60 Minutes. Contact him on 800.258.8076.

Related posts:

1. Are Your Kids Safe Online?
2. Facebook Safety Survival Guide
3. 6 Abuses for Facebook Places

By clicking on the Learn More button you will be directed to the Controlling How You Share Page:

This page will contain a long list of descriptions of your privacy settings, what you can control and what is made public and out of your control.  Click Edit your privacy settings to make the appropriate changes to protect your information and what you want to share on Facebook.

Take the time to make sure you go step by step. Missing one option or click could mean sharing more information than you would like. Make sure you visit your Applications and Websites, Block Lists (if there is a specific person you are hiding your page from), and your Basic Directory Information.

Keep in mind, while the ability to understand your privacy settings has been made simpler, the settings themselves have not changed. You are still sharing information with businesses and advertisers with every “like” you click. Your interests are still linked and by choosing friends of friends you are still basically allowing everyone to view your profile.

Also, one of the main gripes about the recent Facebook Changes was the new “Instant Personalization” feature, which provides information about you to Yelp, Pandora, and a new Microsoft service called Docs.com to help them customize your experience. The main issue was that it was turned on by default – and it still is! If you don’t want to share this information, make sure you visit the Privacy Settings for Instant Personalization and turn it off.

Although these settings will help you keep your Facebook Profile protected, it isn’t foolproof. We offer a Facebook Safety Survival Guide that can help you protect yourself and your children online.  The best way to protect yourself while on social networking sites is to limit what you post and use your common sense.

John Sileo helps businesses tackle social networking privacy concerns. His clients include the Department of Defense, the FTC, Pfizer and the FDIC. John also holds a Privacy Survival Boot Camp. To learn more about having him speak at your next meeting or conference or working directly with your business, contact him by email or on 800.258.8076

Related posts:

1. Facebook Privacy: Know Your Settings
2. Facebook Privacy Settings Update
3. Why Facebook Privacy Settings Don’t Matter

Identity theft of medical records has more than doubled since 2008, as stated in Javelin’s 2010 Identity Fraud Survey Report. It’s not difficult to imagine the misery that a million Americans have suffered during the past two years when their identities were stolen. And the Poneman Institute, in their National Study on Medical Identity Theft, states that another half million people loaned their insurance cards to uninsured family members and friends. The unsavvy lenders have incurred huge medical bills in this “friendly fraud”.

Larry Ponemon says that, on average, it costs $20,000 to resolve a medical identity theft case. Unlike credit card companies,where the banks incur the losses, the victims often have to pay for the fraudulent care and sometimes lose their health insurance or have to pay higher premiums to restore their accounts. Even though there are HIPAA laws to protect your privacy, not all health care organizations have strict safeguards in place.

The risk goes even further: if someone is treated using your identity, your medical records will more than likely be altered and could compromise your treatment and ability to get service.  According to Larry Ponemon, “stolen medical records offer a complete dossier to get a passport in a victim’s name that could be used for terrorism.”

Ways to Protect Yourself:

• When you receive an Explanation of Benefits from insurers, read it carefully and save – don’t throw it away even when it says “this is not a bill”! If a treatment date or doctor’s name is not familiar to you, call the insurer and the billing physician to resolve.
• If your wallet is stolen, contact your insurance company just as you would your credit card company. Don’t carry your Medicare card in your wallet. Carry a photocopy and black out the last four digits of the SS#.
• Urge your health care providers to ask patients for photo ID’s.
• Ask your doctors for copies of everything in your medical files, even if you have to pay for them.
• Monitor your credit report at www.AnnualCreditReport.com. If you see medical billing errors, contact your insurer and the three credit bureaus, TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax.
• Avoid Internet and storefront offers of free treatment and supplies.
• Ask for a list of benefits paid in your name and an “accounting of disclosures” which shows who got your records.

John Sileo became one of America’s leading Information Control Speakers & sought after Identity Theft Experts after he lost his business and more than $300,000 to identity theft and data breach. His clients include the Department of Defense, Pfizer and the FDIC. To learn more about having him speak at your next meeting or conference, contact him by email or on 800.258.8076.

Related posts:

1. Health Insurance Fraud: Why pay when you can steal?
2. Detection-Fraud: 15 Signs You’re a Victim of Identity Theft!
3. Discover and Recover Quickly from Identity Theft in 2010

Maybe that is why Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg confessed on Monday that the quickly expanding social network had “missed the mark” when it comes to its complex privacy controls — and pledged to do better.

Can you imagine keeping up with all your Privacy Settings every time Facbook makes a change? Until Facebook figures it out, a new Privacy Awareness Group—ReclaimPrivacy.org, has developed a tool that scans your Facebook privacy settings to tell you how secure your personal information is. The tool comes in the form of a bookmark for your web browser.  Start by dragging the bookmark from the website above to your bookmarks/favorites. Then, log into your Facebook account, go to the privacy settings screen and click on the bookmark. After the tool scans your privacy settings in six areas—Facebook’s Instant Personalization feature; your personal data; contact information; friends, tags, and connections; what your friends can share about you; and whether applications can leak your personal data—it tells you what areas are secure and where you may want to consider tweaking your settings.

If you have received any sort of fraud training, I am sure you are thinking: How do I know that ReclaimPrivacy.org will respect my privacy and isn’t just trying to get access to my personal Facebook page? Great question. The Website says it never sees your Facebook data nor does it share your personal information (take this for what you will). It also publishes the source code for its scanning tool in the name of transparency (the experts at PCWorld/MacWorld checked this out and found it to be sound).

After the scan is complete,  this window (above) rises to the top and shows three levels of concern. Green means you are secure, Yellow means you could tighten your settings, and Red means you are at high risk. It provides helpful links to guide you to the pages where you need to tighten your settings.

It is recommended that you perform this scan in all browsers you use (Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, etc.). Users have noted that they get different results in different web browsers. This brings up an important point about this tool and other privacy tools – nothing works flawlessly and nothing replaces good old-fashioned human involvement. This tool is a starting point to simplify the process, but don’t let it be the only tool. Take time to manually investigate your Facebook Privacy.

Although Zuckerberg has promised privacy changes to better suit Facebook users in the coming weeks, perhaps this tool can help users rest easy in the mean time.

Order your copy of the Facebook Safety Survival Guide to make sure you and your children are protected online.

John Sileo helps corporations tackle social networking privacy concerns. His clients include the Department of Defense, Pfizer and the FDIC. To learn more about having him speak at your next meeting or conference, contact him by email or on 800.258.8076.

Related posts:

1. Facebook Privacy Settings Update
2. Facebook Changing Privacy Settings – Again!
3. Why Facebook Privacy Settings Don’t Matter