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Living with credit (248)
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New, interesting products (69)
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Research, regulation, industry reports (176)
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Rewards (23)
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Protecting yourself (113)
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The fine print (36)
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Credit card miscellany (280)
Protecting yourself
Watch out, credit card users: A new scam has been reported. It's not uncommon for unusual charges to appear on one's credit statement -- identity theft happens all the time. What's not common is for many people to have the same mysterious charge.
Spring break is a prime time for scam artists to prey on young adults looking for a good time. Read these tips to learn how to protect yourself and your credit card when making travel plans.
Identity theft is incredibly prevalent -- the FTC recently estimated that there are 8.3 million identity theft victims in America each year -- but even with all the press it gets, a new survey reveals that consumers aren't doing everything they can to fight it.
Tax season is the jackpot for identity thieves. Millions of documents containing personal and financial information linger in mailboxes and float about the Internet. The FTC has just released a warning to consumers about two tax-time schemes to be aware of.
Most people who visit Disney resorts come away with pleasant memories and fulfilled dreams. Sadly, some recent visitors experienced something less magical: financial losses to the tune of $11,000.
Originally, text messages were used to send notes to friends while stuck in class or to tell someone something brief. Then they became a way to vote in reality television hits and win prizes with game shows. More recently, as my colleague Connie Prater reported in a blog, debt collectors are beginning to e-mail and text debtors who dodge phone calls. Now, the most recent group behind text messaging: identity thieves.
Do you owe money? Should debt collectors be able to e-mail, text or IM consumers about paying their financial obligations?
BlueHippo Funding, LLC and BlueHippo Capital LLC, owe up to $5 million for consumer redress to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that the firms broke federal laws.
A person's identity -- including a U.S. bank account, credit card, date of birth and government issued identification number -- can be bought for about $10.
Earlier this week, the Federal Trade Commission unveiled its list of leading consumer fraud complaints for 2007. Topping the FTC's complaint list for the seventh-straight year: identity theft.
Concerned consumers, breathe a sigh of relief: A report released yesterday by Javelin Strategy & Research reveals that identity fraud is on the decline in most of America. It also reinforces a three-year trend that the majority of information stolen by criminals is taken from personal belongings and phone calls -- not online.
Please weigh in with the most wild or ridiculous charges you have ever heard of being put on a corporate credit card. I'll share the best responses in a future posting.
Everyone has seen those annoying ads and e-mails that say, "Click here to receive a free Xbox 360!" or "Congratulations, you've been chosen to win a Dell laptop! Click here to claim your prize." Most of us are wise enough to realize there's a catch, but many naïve Internet users click on them. The company putting out those ads has just made a settlement on charges from the Federal Trade Commission, because as we probably all could have guessed, those freebies aren't free.
Buying gadgets and gizmos from infomercials may seem like a good idea at the time, but not all those companies are legitimate. You could find yourself stuck with bogus credit card charges and an inactive customer service telephone number.
An operation marketing prepaid debit cards to consumers with poor credit has agreed to pay more than $2.2 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it "made unauthorized debits from consumers’ bank accounts and engaged in deceptive marketing practices," according to an FTC press release.
Suze Orman and TrustedID have teamed up to create a kit to stop identity theft before it happens.
Do you feel your credit card information is safe when you shop online? Two newly released reports may give you reason to pause before you answer that question.
The Federal Trade Commission, as part of its effort to fight identity theft, wants feedback on one of the newest ID-theft tools -- the credit freeze.
All the talk of identity theft in the news recently wasn't just hype: the Identity Theft Resource Center, a nonprofit group, just announced that 2007 was the worst year ever for personal data theft. My good friend was a victim, and I even had a close call. But if you do find yourself in identity theft doodoo, Mari Frank is a good person to know.
Watch out for warranty cards. They leave you vulnerable to telemarketers.
The New Year brings a new federal regulation that will help prevent more telemarketers from pestering you with offers during the dinner hour at home, spamming your email boxes or clogging your home mailbox with junk mail.
Congressional heat on the credit card industry just turned up a notch. A key congresswoman is floating a bill that would abolish many of the card issuers' practices that consumers find most offensive, including double-cycle billing, universal default and hiding rate changes in tiny type.
What do you do with your credit cards when they're worn, expired or no longer fit in your wallet? Rock, paper, scissors?
A slew of "convenience" checks in the mail remind me that shredders are a thoughtful holiday gift.
I am always fascinated when I read a story about someone really well-off and educated who has decided to live a life of crime. What makes them abandon legitimate living for the dark side? Why do they steal when they come from a family with money?
Those questions raced through my mind last week when I read about 22-year-old Jocelyn Kirsch and her 25-year old boyfriend, Edward Anderton, now coined Bonnie and Clyde. They were privately schooled and come from good families, but they are being charged with identity theft, forgery, unlawful use of a computer and more.
A friend recently burned me a book on CD called "Life's Little Annoyances." It's about real people who had enough of something that massively annoyed them and did something about it. One vignette is about a successful woman who was furious that every time she went out to dinner with her husband, the waiter automatically handed him the bill. Never once was it given to her -- even when she gestured that she'd take it.
It's every party animal's worst nightmare: Spending a wild night of fun at a bar or club only to later realize that your credit card has been charged thousands more than you remember spending. In August, this happened to Thomas Salter, a Georgia Tech alum who celebrated college graduation with a few friends and an American Express card he shares with his father.
I graduated from the University of Texas in May. During those four years, I can't tell you how many times I saw students on their way to class being bribed to sign up for a credit card in exchange for a slice of pizza or an oversized T-shirt. To me, it seemed moronic to become financially obligated in such a serious way just for some free greasy food or cheapo merchandise, but it appears that many students have fallen for these tricks.
Call me old-fashioned, but I want my cell phone to be a phone ONLY. Well, unless it's an iPhone, but that is a whole different species. I'm talking about all these new phone/MP3 player combinations featured in commercials with Beyonce. Or paying extra for a phone with a built-in camera and video camera, with quality so terrible, it's difficult to decipher what the fuzzy images are. I am perfectly content with having a sturdy iPod, a high-quality camera and a well-made cell phone rather than combine them and compromise quality and usability. Now that there is talk of mobile phones being used as credit cards, I am, as you can imagine, not thrilled with the idea.
According to a recently released survey from the Federal Trade Commission, 13.5 percent of the adult U.S. population fell victim to fraud in 2005. Of the 30.2 million Americans that got scammed, credit cards were the payment method in 37 percent of all cases, making plastic "the most commonly used method of payment for fraudulent transactions."
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Your credit can turn against you in cases of identity theft, frauds or scams. This is where to keep up with the latest tricks and survival tips to keep credit cards safe and credit history spotless.
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