CNYCentral.com Report on Identity Theft Quotes RESCUECOM

Internet identity theft protection

SONY is now offering its US Playstation and QRIOCITY customers up to a million dollars in identity theft insurance, after over 100-million user accounts have been affected by its recent security breach.

SONY's Chairman and CEO Howard Stringer has posted an online letter, apologizing for the inconvenience and ongoing concern: names, birth dates, email addresses and log-in information may have been compromised, and SONY says encrypted credit data from ten million suer accounts may have also been compromised.

One concern by Internet observers: the security breach was identified April 19th, but SONY did not acknowledge it until April 26th. Josh Kaplan, President of Rescuecom, says people who use the Internet can take better precautions to protect their data, and their finances, from online predators. Among the suggestions:

>Don't wait til your bank and credit card statements are sent to you: if you monitor accounts on-line you can see and activity irregularities right away, and stop them before they're serious.

>For online transactions, either use a credit card for online accounts only, or use a prepaid debit card to minimize your financial risk.