Maintaining Online Privacy – 5 Tips

 

Every time you buy something online, post an update on Facebook, or tweet your followers, your audience is larger than you could ever imagine.

You, yes you, are being watched.  Every online click of the mouse leaves a cyber-footprint that is proving itself quite valuable in terms of research, as well as advertising.  Just last week, it was revealed that Facebook allowed researchers to manipulate users’ news feeds by giving the researchers the ability to hide “good news” and “bad news” to see if it affected the emotions of other users.  No, none of the users “signed up” per se, but offered their consent by clicking the “I have read and agreed to all terms” fine print when signing up to Facebook originally.  It’s all in the fine print that no one reads.

More and more, online privacy is becoming an issue.  At the CMP Group, we regularly use social media in our investigations.  Take it from us how to maintain some sort of privacy online.

Sign out of your online accounts.

It’s convenient to have all your passwords memorized by the computer.  At a very innocent level someone could easily impersonate you on your social networks, maybe write some ridiculous update or share a picture you would have never shared.  Maybe they are just watching you.  At a more sophisticated level, if your computer was ever hacked, someone now has access to any and all accounts that you have left open.

Don’t be too “friendly”.
Navigating and setting Facebook privacy settings can be quite time consuming.  Invest the time in yourself and your online life with privacy settings, there are great tutorials out there.   We can all be friends, but make your online social life reflect your actual social life.  Give people different levels of access, not everyone in your life is privy to certain information.  Also, be wary of people you don’t recognize who friend you.  If they are “mutual friends” with your Aunt Sally in Florida, your old college roommate in Atlanta, an old friend that you barely speak to and one of your co-workers (all of whom have never been in the same state together, let alone the same room), it’s quite doubtful that the one requesting your friendship actually knows these people, or you for that matter.  They may be trying to get into your social network for one reason or another.  Deny them and alert your contacts.

Keep your devices password protected.
If your phone and tablet are left open and unlocked, think of it as leaving your home or car unlocked.  Everything is fine, until it’s not.  Your cellphone is so much more than a phone.  You have most, if not all of your contacts saved, in addition to your banking, email, pictures, files, or company information, right on your device.

Wipe out your lost/stolen device.
Speaking of that device, install an app on your device that allows you to erase all the data from a separate device in the event it’s lost or stolen.  Yes, it’s unfortunate that you lost your brand new iPhone, but the amount of data on that iPhone is the real loss, especially if it’s manipulated for any sort of criminal activity.

Google alert yourself.
Google has a handy feature called Google Alert.  It alerts you daily (depending on your settings) for search terms that you’d like to see updates on.  If you enter your name , and variations of your name. This is an easy way to see if there is anything online that you are unaware of – news articles, pictures, etc.

 

 

Four Reasons to Conduct an Asset Search

Below are the top four reasons the CMP Protective and Investigative Group is retained to perform an Asset Investigation.  Also referred to as an Asset Search or Check, this type of investigation involves a search of public and proprietary records to locate personal property, real estate or tangible assets held by either an individual or corporate entity.

1. Litigation
   Oftentimes investigators are retained by lawyers or their clients before litigation commences. Sometime to retain us before litigation is better than during.  To commence an asset investigation before actually filing litigation to discover if the person or entity can even cover the amount you may be seeking or even come close to it. If the person doesn’t have the assets, allowing you to make an informed decision to proceed with potentially costly litigation. It may not be in your interest to pursue the case.  Under any circumstances never tip off the party that you may conduct an asset investigation, because it may allow them to start hiding assets.This form of investigation is important in a divorce case, if you feel your spouse is hiding assets.  It’s also great if you are looking to potentially settle a case.  If your opponent doesn’t have the financial power to continue on, and you know this, you may be able to use this bit of knowledge to facilitate a settlement.

2. Issuing a Loan
   It’s wise, when lending money, to see what assets the receiving person or entity has just in case they decide to not pay you back.

3. Recovering a judgment
   Winning the case is only half of it, the other half is spent finding assets to seize with your judgment.

4. Fraud
   A red flag for an embezzlement cases is when the person(s) in question is living a lifestyle far above their means.  An example of this is Rita Crundwell – a small town controller who embezzled $50 million and had her own thoroughbred horse farm, despite the fact that her salary was only $80,000 at the time of her arrest.

White-Collar Crimes in Small Businesses

When most people think of white-collar crime, they think of Enron, Bernie Madoff, Martha Stewart or the father of the Ponzi Scheme – Charles Ponzi.

It is all relative.

While some crimes cost companies millions of dollars, some crimes can cause a small business thousands of dollars (which seem like millions to them).

White-collar crime includes lying, stealing or cheating in a business setting. In total these crimes cost the United States around $300 billion (yes that’s with a “b”) a year.

Internal Theft by Employees

Often, a small business has one person overseeing a certain department, this is fine usually, except for billing. A good example would be a single bookkeeper who has check signing ability, prepares the accounting and financial statements in addition to reconciling the books. Allowing one person to have that much authority could expose the company to potential money laundering schemes and embezzlement.

1. Have two signatures required on company checks to ensure that more than one person is aware of company disbursements.

2. Have an independent accountant perform audits without informing the bookkeeper.

Vendor Fraud

Vendors also commit white-collar crimes, usually various types of consumer fraud.

Here are a few common examples:

-Your company bought a bulk order of pens at a significantly lower price, but after delivery learns the pens are only half full of ink.

-Your company gives a deposit to a vendor for supplies but soon after rendering payment that vendor has packed up shop and left with your deposit, nowhere to be found.

To help prevent these types of fraud:

1. Create an approved list of vendors that are tried and true.
2. Have a policy in place where a new vendor needs to be approved..
3. Do your own investigation –search the Better Business Bureau for their rating and any past issues.

If you liked this post, maybe you’ll like ways to secure your small business. 

Three tips to secure your small business.

At the CMP Protective and Investigative Group we provide security consulting for Forbes 500 companies.  While they have the budget to have a consultation, small businesses and start-ups should invest in their security too.

It would be self-serving to list the many reasons why you should have a security consultant come into your business, but there are quite a few.

Instead, of going down the laundry list, here’s 10 things that you can do/facilitate to help safe-guard your business.

1. Perform Background checks

Understandably, small businesses or a start ups usually forgo a background check.  Their rationale is:

I’m a good judge of character.
You may well be, but a con artists is even better at playing a character. We’ve had clients absolutely shocked about what is in someone’s background check, when they’ve made such a good first impression. 

Their references were great.
Who would provide a potential employer with the means to obtain a bad reference?

They have a lot of connections and endorsements on LinkedIn.
While LinkedIn is a great tool for hiring (we use it too), endorsements and connections may be made up.  You can buy connections (to make yourself look like you have a vast network and obtain the coveted +500 connections on your profile) along with buying recommendations.

Background checks help weed out candidates that may have not disclosed criminal history, as well as make the employer aware of judgments, liens and driving records which may act as a red flag.

2. Cyber Security

Treat cyber security as business problem, not a technical problem.  Talk to your IT professional about ways to safe guard your data, not only on your computer but on your servers.  Billing information that is kept on your computer is a treasure trove for identity thieves.  Usually you don’t know your security has been compromised until well after. A recent example would be the heartbleed bug – a flaw in the SSL system that allowed crooks an easy way in to mine for valuable information for two years.

3. Division of Labor

The only person that should hold the skeleton key is you.  In small businesses the it is often “all hands on deck” way of working.  While this may be great while all is good, it’s terrible if there is some sort of internal theft and develops into a full blown investigation.  It’s imperative to not allow a large group of employees to freely access information when it comes to billing (either yours or the clients).  An example of this could be: your staff of five, all having access to accounts receivables.  Instead, delegate tasks and have a system of checks and balances.

Identity theft begins with these 8 types of numbers

 

 

1. Phone Numbers

Most people have their phone number displayed on the web.  It makes sense, because you want people to be able to call you.  There are caller ID frauds that allow someone to call a company and put your telephone in the company’s caller ID, therefore impersonating you in an attempt to scam them, using YOUR number.  It’s fairly easy to do.  If you want to list your cell phone online, don’t list your direct cell phone line, instead use an application like google voice and provide that number for use online.  When people call your google voice number, it goes directly to your phone without revealing any personal information, such as your billing name and address.

 2. Dates and ZIPs

Birthdays, college attendance, employment, when you resided at a particular address, ZIP codes associated with open bank and credit card accounts.  These can help a scam artist to impersonate you to either gain access to your sensitive information, or allow them enough information to act as you to open news accounts.  In order to protect this, you may want to give “just enough” information.  Yes, we all love birthday wishes on social media, but leave your year of birth out of the public view.  Besides, it works well if you are turning 40 for the 6^th time in a row.

 3.     PIN Codes

Card-skimmers use a device to capture your debit card information while a camera records you as you type in your PIN code, making it very easy for a thief to replicate.  In short an ATM or gas station pump that has been hacked scans your card information and then is relayed to the scammer.  Sometimes they even control the camera which shows you typing your pin number.  Thereafter, this information is sold on the black market to make phony credit or debit cards with.  Try using your bank’s ATM – not the random ones in a convenience store.  When you go to the gas pump, use your credit card, not your debit card, better yet, try to use cash.

 4. Social Security Numbers

I hope by now people have stopped carrying their social security card in their wallet!  Your Social Security number is the skeleton key to your finances. There are many places that ask for it, but don’t actually need it. Be very careful about who gets it and find out how they collect it, store it and protect it. Whenever you’re asked for your SSN, always consider whether the request is logical based upon the context of your relationship with them.

 5. Bank Account Numbers

Your bank account number is on your checks, which makes a personal check one of the least secure ways to pay for something. Consider using a credit card or online bill pay through your bank instead.

 6. IP Addresses

Scammers can use malware and a remote access tool (RAT) to lock files on your computer and then demand a ransom in exchange for access.  A message informing a user that his or her IP address is associated with online criminal activity is a common scare tactic used in ransom malware scams.  I have news for you, if law enforcement felt that you were involved in online criminal activity, they wouldn’t send you an email.  Do not respond to it.  Bring your computer to the authorities, most likely there are others that are being targeted too. 

 7. Driver’s License and Passport Numbers

These are critical elements of your personally identifiable information that represent major pieces of your identity.  Once scammers have the number, these documents can be easily counterfeited. Countless times each day, millions of personal documents undergo major makeovers and suddenly feature new names, addresses and photographs of fraudsters.

8. Health Insurance Account Numbers

Health insurance fraud is on the rise, and one of the biggest growth areas is identity-related health care crimes. Besides inconvenient, in terms of your credit and finances, this can be life threatening – imagine a fraudster’s medical information gets commingled with yours (blood type changes, eliminating certain allergies to meds or presenting new ones). When treatment is prescribed based upon incorrect information in the file the results could be deadly.

Be paranoid.

Data breaches such as the one with Target over the holidays, the recentBlackShades Malware and Heartbleed aren’t the sexiest of criminal activities, but they are where crime is going, not just in the future, but now.  You have to read about them.  Every new data breach, a compromise in security and scam could become crucial news to you.  It also may highlight some of your security weaknesses such as using your kids names in your passwords or using the absolute worst password ‘123456’.

Intellectual Property Theft Investigations

Everything is started with an idea.  Intellectual property refers to creations of the mind, such as inventions, literary and artistic works, designs as well as branding symbols, names and images.

Intellectual property (IP) is protected by US patents copyright and trademarks which enables people to earn recognition and/or financial benefit from what they have created.

The four main types of intellectual property are:

• Patents 
  For inventions – new and improved products and processes that are capable of industrial application.
• Trademarks
  For brand identity – of goods and services allowing distinctions to be made between different traders.
• Designs for product appearance
  Of the whole or a part of a product resulting from the features of, in particular, the lines, contours, colors, shape, texture or materials of the product itself or its ornamentation.
• Copyright for material
  Literary and artistic material, music, films, sound recordings and broadcasts, including software and multimedia.

As always, in every industry, there are thieves.  Like the saying goes, copying is the highest form of flattery.  Chances are, if someone is trying to steal your idea, it must be a good one.

What should you do if someone steals, copies or uses your intellectual property?

You should seek legal counsel immediately.  If you were smart you should have gotten a patent, trade mark or copyright (depending on the medium).

One of the first steps, usually, is sending them a “Cease and Desist” letter which informs the user that the work is yours and that if it’s not taken down within a certain period of time, you will take legal action.

This is usually where we come in.  Private investigators at the CMP Group conduct IP investigations in a number of ways.

• Forensics accounting

• Computer forensics (aiding with electronic discovery)

• Surveillance

• Undercover Work

Charmed Robbery – White Collar Crime

On White Collar Crime Wednesday, we usually outline famous (infamous) white collar crime cases such as; where the term Ponzi Schemeoriginated, the Real Wolf of Wall Street and the Types of White Collar Crimes.

Today’s title should allude as to what we are blogging about today.  Con-men (and women) and their ability to charm, convince and deceive people out of millions of dollars.

Bernie Madoff (Madoff Ponzi Scheme) and Jordan Belfort (better known as the Wolf of Wall Street) had one characteristic in common, charm.

According to various studies conducted by the Association of Certified Examiners, approximately 90% of white collar criminals have no previous criminal record.  It also shows that the higher the monetary value of the economic crime, the less likely that the perpetrator will have a previous criminal record.

How do you protect yourself and your business?

White Collar Criminals need four components to exist: Money, Trust, Greed and Opportunity.  When you remove one of these (especially trust and opportunity) your chance of being a victim significantly decreases.

Most criminals will only commit a crime if they believe the benefit trump the risk.  Do not be too trust worthy and also surround yourself with objective and trusted advisors – outside of the firm you are working with.

 

 

 

 

Is someone following me? When private investigators are hired for counter surveillance

At the CMP Group we perform all sorts of surveillance.  In past blog posts we have talked about the different types of surveillance an investigative firm are commonly asked to perform; cheating spouse, personal injury and child custody.

There’s another type of surveillance too, counter surveillance.

Counter surveillance is when a client hires an investigative firm to make sure that no one is following them (i.e. another investigative firm, stalker, disgruntled employee, corporate espionage agents, ex-lovers).

How is counter surveillance done?

In short we would follow you and identify vehicles and individuals who seem to be following you.  Once we identify the person(s) that are following you, we would attempt to identify them if you are unsure who they are.

Keep in mind someone may not just be following you on the street but also via your technology via spyware that can be installed on computers, tablets and phones).  To combat this, counter surveillance may include:

• Bug Sweeps (Technical Surveillance Counter Measures –TSCM)
• Computer forensics

What do I do with that information?

If you know that person (ex, stalker, disgruntled employee, etc.) and are fearful of them, counter surveillance may offer proof that they are stalking you which will facilitate action by your local authorities, such as a restraining order.

World Cup Security – Executive Protection

Every major sporting event comes with their unique security challenges. At the Sochi Winter Olympics we blogged about threats of terrorism and political unrest.

In Brazil we see a myriad of challenges. While terrorism is a concern, more consideration is being given to protesting crowds and the crime in Brazil.

Soccer’s FIFA World Cup should be looking for protection against both foreign and domestic threats. Brazil has American bomb-busting robots, German anti-aircraft tanks and Israeli surveillance drones at their disposal.

Unlike the terrorism concerns at Sochi’s Winter Olympics, authorities are focused on unruly fans, political unrest, drug trafficking and citizens that are protesting against the cost of the games. These concerns address both the players and fans, but there are extra steps to take in terms to securing someone who requires high-level security – executive protection.

At the CMP Group we have a division that provides executive protection to clients world-wide.

Each individual and organization has unique security requirements.
-Risk and Threat Assessment
-Advance Logistical Evaluations

Secure the area, wherever you are.
– Executive Travel Coordination
– Have access to armor plated cars and explosive detection devices.

Here are some things that are considered when planning for executive protection detail.

Each individual and organization has unique security requirements.
-Risk and Threat Assessment
-Advance Logistical Evaluations

While security guards are mostly using brawn, executive protection details combine brains and brawn.

Brawn
Former law enforcement and military professionals are trained in hand to hand combat and weaponry.

Brains
Able to identify threats based on intelligence regarding the protectee and pinpointing threats.