Beware & Protect Yourself 03 (Sep 10 - Dec 14)

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Three New Ways to Protect Your Identity in 2012 by Justine Rivero

Don’t start 2012 as the victim of identity theft.

It’s a $37 billion crime that affects 1 in 25 Americans, with the average victim suffering $631 in out-of-pocket costs, reports Javelin Strategy & Research. Identity theft and fraud has become more difficult to detect and resolve in recent years, resulting in even higher consumer costs.

Your bank account isn’t the only casualty of identity theft and fraud; time is another significant cost. The average identity fraud case will cost a consumer 33 hours to resolve—equivalent to more than four work days.

Whether or not you think you are susceptible, it takes just a few easy entry points for thieves to discover your personal information and abuse it at your expense.

If you use mobile banking, social networking sites (such as Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn), shop online, access Wi-Fi in public areas, discard sensitive documents like bill statements without using a paper shredder, pay your bills via traditional mail, or hand off your credit card at a restaurant, you’re already at high risk of identity theft.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/moneywisewo ... y-in-2012/

[winston]

Tourist survives bungee jump horror

A young tourist relates how she swam to safety with both her legs tied after her bungee cord snapped.

http://sg.news.yahoo.com/video/world-26 ... 12774.html

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Richard is the editor of the U.S. & World Early Warning Report, an investment newsletter so highly-regarded it's read by the likes of Ron Paul and officials at the Pentagon and CIA.


Daily Crux: Can you share some of the specific preparations you recommend?

Maybury: As far as emergency supplies, you should have at least a month's worth of food and water. In my opinion, the best food options are from Mountain House Freeze Dried. They have a shelf life of around 30 years if stored in a cool, dry place, they're fairly good quality as these things go, and you don't need to cook it.

So if you can afford it, a month's supply of Mountain House Freeze Dried food is an excellent way to go. It also stores in a small area, which is a big advantage.

Along with food and water, you want to have medical supplies. One thing people often overlook is that in a disaster or crisis situation, the supply of drugs is often cut off.

So if there is a type of medication that you absolutely have to have, you should talk to your doctor now about writing a somewhat larger prescription and stocking up, so you have a reserve supply if you ever need it.

In addition to basic necessities, all responsible persons should be able to defend themselves. I think the day is coming when you won't sleep much at night if you don't have the ability to protect yourself and your loved ones.

There are numerous other items that folks may want to have on hand, but these can vary considerably depending on individual circumstances. If you'd like to learn more, I recommend picking up one of the many excellent books on preparedness.

But one last item I think everyone should have – and many folks don't think about – are fire extinguishers. Very often, protests and riots literally turn into incendiary incidents... we've seen it time and again, as recently as this year in Los Angeles. So be sure you have lots of fire extinguishers and other fire-fighting equipment.

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Crux: Any other general steps you recommend readers take?

Maybury: Probably the most important thing – assuming you've stocked up on the essential items we already discussed –is learning to think like people in other countries do.

For example, if you were born in Paris, one of the things you would learn growing up is that you should be on the lookout for spontaneous strikes.

My wife and I were visiting Paris and came up out of the subway one morning to find we were in the middle of a spontaneous strike against some business. It was quickly turning into a riot, and we were nearly caught in the middle of it without realizing.

Of course, Parisians knows that Parisians do this sort of thing, so they're on the lookout for it all the time. You come up out of the subway and you look around and see if it's safe or not.

That's just one specific example, but Americans have to start thinking like that – developing those kinds of precautions that they take automatically as second nature.

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Unfortunately, I think it's going to be an awful lot worse than things normally are in Paris, so you'll have to be even more cautious than a Parisian would be.

For example, if you walk into a fast food restaurant and notice that there are no condiments set out for easy access – where you have to ask for them at the counter – that's a sign it could be a high-risk area, that there may be lot of crime there.

These kinds of clues aren't any big deal in the world we live in at the moment, but I think they're going to become extremely important in the next few years, and possibly this year.

Another good idea if you can do it is to have a secondary vehicle that looks old and beat up. We have a president who's teaching everybody that the rich are the enemy, and the 1% is the enemy of the 99%... So you want to be sure not to look like one of the 1%, whether you are or not. You want to be able to fade into the crowd if necessary.

Along the same lines... if you work in a white collar job, it's a good idea to have some old clothes in your desk that you can change into on your way home if there's a riot or some other kind of disturbance. Again, the idea is not to stand out.

We're living in a world now where being successful is dangerous. As the government – especially the president – keeps pushing more and more that successful people are the enemy, you're going to have to be a lot more cautious about where you go and what you look like when you get there.

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Crux: That brings up a good point. We've talked about the dangers of riots, mob violence, and crime... but what about police or government violence? Is this something readers should be concerned about as well?


Maybury: As far as violence from the authorities, you always have to be aware of the state of mind of the police. A policeman is just an ordinary person who maybe lives down the block from you and has some special training in law enforcement — but he's not Superman, and he has emotions.

What happens in a civil disturbance situation is that very often, it goes on for hours and hours... and sometimes days. A police officer starts getting tired. There are people throwing nasty stuff at him. He may eventually get to the end of his rope. He might actually be a very nice guy, but he's got a breaking point.

So you have to be watching the police, watch their faces – if you are in the neighborhood of a violent incident – to see how close the police are to their breaking point.

Believe me, you don't want to be around if they get pushed over the edge, because they have serious weapons and they know how to use them.

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The same thing goes for the military. You may remember the Kent State massacre in 1970. That was a case where the National Guard troops were just pushed over the edge.

They were left out there in the sun for hours and hours, and they didn't know what was going on. Nobody really knows what triggered it off, but it ended with trained troops firing military weapons into crowds of helpless civilians. That's the kind of thing that can happen.

They are human beings who have breaking points... And whenever you're in the presence of law enforcement people who are armed, you have to assess how close they are to their breaking points.

In my opinion, in almost every case that you run into like this, just get out of Dodge as fast as you can. Don't hang around to see what happens, because you can wind up being a statistic.

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If you have older relatives, you may want to warned them about such scams. Older people tend to believe in the internet and when they get an email from a bank like HSBC, they tend to think that it's true ....

================================================

Hello,

I am Mrs Teresa Au, HSBC Hong Kong, head of corporate sustainability Asia pacific region.

A sum of US$23,200,000.00 Million was deposited by our Late customer who died without declaring any next of kin before his death in 2006.

My suggestion to you is to stand as the next of kin to Fadel Ahmed.

We shall share in the ratio of 50% for me, 50% for you. Please contact me via this email.([email protected])

Thanks
Teresa Au.

[winston]

US$28.5m Business Proposal

My name is Engr. Philip Ezoma the Contract Award Committee Chairman in the Nigerian National Petroleum Cooperation (NNPC) click here for full details of the proposal.

[kennynah]

i see the word, "Nigeria".... i click spam/junk immediately