Data Security: Online Trade of Personal Data

• Credit specialist CreditExpert (Experian) has been considering online personal data traffics and shows that more than 12 million pieces of information have been traded online by fraudsters between January and April 2012. In just four months, this figure already exceeds 2010’s overall rates (9.5 million pieces of personal information).

• Most of the times (90%), logins and passwords combinations are concerned. This soar could partly be explained by the increasing number of accounts per users (in the UK 26 accounts on average). According to Experian, despite this proliferation, British people would generally use five passwords only for all their accounts and 24% would even use a single one.

Source: Experian press release

• According to the UK fraud prevention service (CIFAS) 86% of card fraud in the UK was carried out online (28% more than in 2011 from January to May). Fraudsters obviously have enough elements at their disposal to bypass the fraud prevention measures set up by payments players among others (dates of birth, e-mails, account numbers, passwords, etc.).

• These simultaneous reports and the sensibility of the data exposed highlight a need for further user education as fairly simple measures may help hinder the risks: avoid scattering sensitive data online, regularly reset passwords, one password per account, use “long” passwords – including alphanumeric and special characters (or, even, use passphrases when possible), etc.