"No one in your organization will care about data security, privacy policies, intellectual property protection, or data breach until they understand what it has to do with them. If your employees and executives don't care about protecting their own identities ( to prevent identity theft), how can you expect them to care about protecting corporate identity (to prevent a data breach)?"
John Sileo, Privacy Means ProfitJohn Sileo’s identity was stolen out of his corporation and used to commit a series of crimes, including $300,000 worth of digital embezzlement. Emerging from this crisis, John became America’s leading professional speaker on identity theft prevention, social media information exposure and corporate data privacy.
In the United States alone, there were approximately 11.2 million victims of ID Fraud in 2009; with over $56 billion in losses. Over the last 5 years 47 million people have been victims of identity theft.
So why then are so many people are ignoring the problem? "Oh, it won't happen to me," people think. They know that identity theft is a problem, but they can't visualize what it would be like to go through.
Most people don't understand that their identity is their most valuable asset. It is worth more than everything they own, combined. Your home, car, credit rating, checking account, mutual funds, and even future earnings are only a portion of what's at stake.
Your identity is your net worth. Your entire financial life. Where it has been, where it is now and where it is going. And people give in to apathy. We hear the stories, but we don't make any changes. We protect our homes with deadbolts and alarms, but we do little to protect our identities, which are worth more!
Identity theft is not just about paper shredders and checklists.
The many checklists that are promoted on so many websites and articles will help you start to protect yourself, but they are usually overwhelming. Like so many people, so busy with work and life that completing hundreds of tasks in a weekend seems daunting. It just doesn't compete with spending time with family and friends.
The result? We fail to take action and leave ourselves vulnerable to attack.
It just reminds us once again that the biggest ally for identity thieves is the continuing apathy of consumers, employees, and even executives.
By first learning to protect their own identities, employees and consumers are acquiring the building blocks necessary to construct a personal and corporate Culture of Privacy.
That's our mission at idtAWARE™, to give consumers and companies the information and training they need to protect themselves, their families, and their companies from the devastating crime of identity theft.