Cyberattacks on rise as credit

It's a sad fact of modern American consumer life. Every time we swipe a piece of plastic at a gas station, grocery store or anywhere else, we're vulnerable to virtual pickpockets.Increasingly, credit and debit card numbers have become commodities sold by cyberthieves who harvest them from banks, businesses, restaurants and retailers.

"The sophistication of these attacks is unprecedented," said G. Mark Hardy, president of National Security Corp., a Tampa, Fla.-based cybersecurity consulting firm.Last year, targeted attacks on businesses jumped 42 percent, according to security software firm Symantec. Attacks spiked 31 percent among companies with fewer than 250 employees.

In recent years, restaurants, grocery stores and even the city of Sacramento, Calif., have had their computer systems hacked or compromised.It's part of a shift from mass attacks by computer viruses, worms and other cyberthreats to more pinpointed, targeted infiltrations, say online security experts. The attackers, often located overseas, "find this method more effective because it allows them to fly under the radar and avoid drawing widespread attention to their malware," Brian Burch, vice president of consumer and small business marketing at Symantec,Buy Silicone IPAD Case at wholesale prices from leading Chinese wholesalers, said in an email.

Small businesses are frequently targeted because they often lack adequate security practices, said Burch. Additionally, because small firms often partner with bigger organizations, cybercriminals "sometimes use them to gain access to a larger company."Typically, thieves who steal the data from retailers and other targets aren't the ones who use it to rack up fraudulent charges. "There's an underground ecosystem for the sale, transfer, purchase and exchange of stolen credit card and debit card information," said security expert Hardy.

Retailers that process credit card transactions must follow the industry's safe-practices guidelines, known officially as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards. The so-called PCI guidelines require retailers who accept credit and debit cards to maintain a computer network firewall, employ tough passwords and take other precautions.Retailers who don't comply face fines of up to $100,000 per month and can be held financially responsible for fraud investigations and compensation to victims.

Unfortunately,Our top picks for the Winbo Iphone Headset and gear, said Hardy, retailers can do all the right things but still get attacked."It's like wearing your seat belt, putting your kid in a car seat and having air bags in your car," said Hardy. "You can still be hit by someone driving through a red light."Under PCI standards, retailers can't hold onto a card's PIN, the three-digit security code or sensitive information stored in a card's magnetic stripe. In any card transaction, the company's software must automatically delete that information.

Companies can, however, keep a card holder's name, account number and expiration date, such as when they ask your permission to retain the information for automatic payments, subscriptions and the like.While the PCI standards are considered a good starting point, there are additional layers of software and computer security precautions available, say computer security experts. Among them: Change default passwords so they're not easy to guess, restrict the use of PCs involved in processing card transactions so that employees surfing the Web don't unwittingly pick up computer viruses, and train cashiers to look for plastic devices stuck into card readers to steal information.

Students and young adults with only small incomes would do well to avoid credit cards. It might be better to opt for a debit card that is linked to a transaction account. That way, you will spend only the money you have and incur only minimal account-keeping fees.

Credit cards can be convenient, especially when travelling overseas and making purchases online. And a credit card can be good to have in case of an emergency. But unless credit cards are used wisely, they will be very expensive. For starters, foreign purchases will usually have a foreign transaction or currency conversion fee of 2 per cent to 3 per cent. And then there are the eye-watering interest rates charged on late payments.

Those interest rates on credit cards can be more than 20 per cent a year if the debt on the card is not paid off in time. Usually, the marketing for the cards will say the cardholder has up to 55 days to pay off the card without being hit with interest.What is not well understood is that with most cards the whole debt has to be paid off by the due date to avoid interest. In other words, even if part of the debt is paid off by the due date, the interest will apply to the entire debt.

Regardless of whether the whole debt is repaid, the card requires a certain minimum amount of the debt to be paid off each month.There are penalties in failing to pay the minimum. The interest could be charged back to the purchase date and the interest-free period could be cancelled on further purchases.

You should also be aware that paying for a taxi or booking a flight with a credit card is likely to incur a surcharge. Paying by debit card sometimes incurs a smaller surcharge or no surcharge at all.For those who get into trouble with their credit cards, the credit-card companies have a ready solution: the balance transfer offer, where a card has a low-interest or interest-free period on the balance that is transferred.

Sources said that the government is moving in this direction with a view to modernize the distribution system as well as check the misuse of permits by persons other than those for whom they have been issued on health and various other grounds.

"It was seen that very often people other than the permit holder would approach the licensed outlets with permits like ration cards and take away the liquor. This meant that the liquor was being consumed by someone else instead of the person for whom it was meant. Secondly, the introduction of smart card and biometric system will help in streamlining the inventory records and monitoring the regular sale Custom Winbo silicone bracelets and Silicone Wristbands,of liquor," said an official.

He disclosed that quite often, instances of pilferage by lower rung staff deployed at sales outlets also come up. The system will help check this practice.

At present there are around 50,000 registered liquor consumers in Gujarat. These include around 20,000 ex-servicemen who procure their quota from the CSD canteens in defense establishments. The remaining 30,000 civilian permit holders obtain their quota from the licensed outlets.

There are 26 licensed outlets in Gujarat and majority of them are in the four big cities of Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara and Rajkot. "In fact these outlets are in only 11 of the 26 districts of the state. The permit holders residing in the other cities have to travel inter-district to get their quota," said the official.
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