The San Luis Obispo Police Department has received an increasing number of “cyber crimes” reported in recent years, which follows a national trend resulting from increased computer use, on-line business, and more sophisticated criminals. Residents and businesses are urged to take appropriate precautions to protect themselves and valuable data from theft or attack.

Free Annual Credit Reports December 1, 2004 marked the first day that California residents were able to take advantage of a new Federal law that requires the three credit reporting companies to provide you with a free annual credit report.

You may access your free credit report by visiting https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp. Once you are on this site, you will be directed to either TransUnion, Equifax, or Experian.

The experts believe you should stagger your free requests throughout the year, rather than making requests of all three credit card companies at the same time. You will have the option of requesting the reports online, over the phone or through the mail. With the burgeoning problem of identity theft, it makes sense to take advantage of the new law.

Federal Trade Commission  Education is a key tool to prevent consumer injury. In this website, you'll find publications with advice on avoiding scams and rip-offs, as well as tips on other consumer topics.

Internet Fraud Complaint Center  The Internet Fraud Complaint Center (IFCC) is a partnership between the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the National White Collar Crime Center (NW3C).

IFCC's mission is to address fraud committed over the Internet. For victims of Internet fraud, IFCC provides a convenient and easy-to-use reporting mechanism that alerts authorities of a suspected criminal or civil violation. For law enforcement and regulatory agencies at all levels, IFCC offers a central repository for complaints related to Internet fraud, works to quantify fraud patterns, and provides timely statistical data of current fraud trends.

National Infrastructure Protection Center  Official website to report cyber crime to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, obtain prevention information for your business or commercial enterprise, special advisories and alerts.

National Cyber Security Alliance  Official location of Stay Safe On Line a cooperative effort of business and government to reduce cyber related crime. This site is especially helpful to beginners and persons needing to take steps to protect home systems from attack.

reportphishing@antiphishing.org  This email can be used to report phishing scam emails or websites. The Anti-Phishing Working Group is a volunteer organization that maintains a repository of phishing scam emails and websites to help people.

Instructions for Submitting Phishing Email:

1. Create a new mail to reportphishing@antiphishing.org

2.Drag and drop the phising email from your inbox onto this new email.

3. Do not use "forward" if you can help it, as this approach loses information and requires more manual processing.

Phishing email examples include: “You have won $1,000,000.00, just send account info. for deposit” or an official LOOKING email of a bank or Pay Pal ect., asking for account information.

Pharming is where a site has been cloned to look authentic, instead, they down load key logger data, request account info., ect.

 

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