My Identity....In High Demand!

They did it again!

I got a phone call Saturday afternoon from my credit card company to confirm purchases made somewhere in New Jersey: $240 at Gap Kids, $200 at Champs, etc.

Of course I haven't spent that much money on clothes, collectively, in a couple years.

Obviously someone had my credit card, at least a facsimile thereof, and was on a shopping spree.

Note this is about the third time in the past couple years that we've had this type of fraud on our account. It's the third time we've had to cut up our credit card....and then go and change our account # on a bazillion recurring bills.

And recall there's that guy down in Orlando that tried to take out a mortgage or something in my name.

Champs, the sports store? Gap Kids??? Those aren't exactly places to buy things which can be re-sold for cash.

Draw your own conclusions...

Privacy For The Paranoid....And Would-Be Stalkers

I can't recall if I highlighted this website before or not - Radaris.com.

Go punch your name up and you might be, as I was, very surprised how *public* your info is.

What to do about this?

Well here's a blog post that tells you how to get your info pulled from some of at least the bigger data scrapers.

Why?

You write a blog post saying, "We're going into Manhattan today to see..." and you come home and find yourself robbed.

You become famous all of a sudden from winning the lottery and your family is kidnapped...

Or, you become infamous all of a sudden and your family is harassed. For example, Steve Bartman!

Personally I really don't like how easy it is to see *relatives* on these websites too. I mean, WTF? Many of my relatives are downright embarrassing...

And They All Want My Body, Too!

They got me again!

I just received a phone call from Bank of America - a fraud alert on my credit card.

Someone tried to spent over $1,000 on it at a Walgreens in Queens last night.  And somehow I sincerly doubt the criminal looked like the lady above.  Just saying...

Neither my wife nor I lost our card so they must have had a counterfeit one made up.

This is the second time this year our card has been co-opted by thieves.

AND recall also that a few months ago I discovered someone co-opting my identity down in Orlando.

Trying To Be Me?

I have a Google email alert on my unique last name (which, incidentally, isn't Nut)...

And I received such an alert the other day saying to *Check out (my name)'s phone number in Florida*. The search engine had come across my name on whitepages.com.

So I finally get around to investigating it and discover that it has me living at a certain address in Orlando. Furthermore, it lists the other names of the household. One of them I recognize as the older sister of my old, OLD college roommate.

Hmmmmm....what's going on here?

For a second I figured maybe his sister's husband somehow got a hold of my name, credit card info, or Social Security number or something.

But then just now I realized that her last name is unchanged AND the same as the other two occupants. So they must be her and my old roommate's parents.

Seeing this queer coincidence and knowing a little about the *career* background of my old friend's *immigrant* parents I strongly suspect that foul play is afoot.

My first instinct is to track down my old buddy and inform him. But I'm going to put that unpleasant discussion on hold for a minute.

I guess I have to do something to make sure my credit hasn't substantially been compromised. There has to be some entity out there that offers such a service.

Any suggestions?

Background - My former roommate was a bit of a shoplifter. And apparently kleptomania was part of his family heritage.  Back in college, some 15-16 years ago, he told me that when he got G.I. Joe figurines for Christmas....they'd always come *without the weapons* and *without the packaging*. As he got older and more perceptive he noticed his mother stuffing store items down her shirt.  The weaponry must have gotten lost in her cleavage!

As for his father....well, have y'all seen the motion picture Scarface?