Internet Crime Report
- Reporting Internet crime can help protect other possible victims from harm. If you're the target of an Internet crime, chances are the same perpetrator is targeting many others.
- Call your local police. If your child becomes the victim of a cybercrime, or you suspect that a predator is targeting your child, call your local police first.
- The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in partnership with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Customs Service, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and state and local law enforcement and Internet Crimes Against Children task forces serves as the national CyberTipline and as the national Child Pornography Tipline. Call 800-843-5678 or visit www.missingkids.com/cybertip.
- EASY-ACCESS INFORMATION One of the best ways to illustrate how easily a stranger can get information about a target is to go to the popular Google search engine at google.com. Type your home telephone number into Google's search bar, and click the search button. If your number is listed, not only will your name pop up, but so will your address and a handy MapQuest map showing the physical location of your phone number. People could use this feature to locate your home address, and receive explicit directions on how to get there from anywhere in the country.
This is a good feature if you're trying to remember how to get to your friendŐs home^; it's not if your middle-schooler who is home alone just gave her phone number to a stranger. The good news: You can remove your name from this Google feature. To do this: Type in your full phone number using dashes like this: 555-123-4567. If your number appears in the mapping database, an icon resembling a telephone will appear to the left of the results.
Click on this icon and it will take you to a page containing a description of the service, and a link to request your number be removed. This feature is not new, as some e-mail warnings have claimed. The PhoneBook service has been offered by Google for at least a year. And the feature does not work for every phone number. Some classes of phone numbers, such as unpublished phone numbers, will not display. The bad news, at least for Internet safety: The information displayed is compiled from a number of publicly accessible sources and is not unique to Google.
There are many other online sources through which users can look up the same information. Google has simply combined two different services readily available on a number of different Web sites into one easy step. Even without Google, it's a simple feat for any moderately knowledgeable Web user to plug a phone number into a reverse phone directory Web site to find the name and address corresponding to that number, then use an online service such as MapQuest to obtain directions to that address.
Source: www.theolympian.com
Cybercrime News Archive
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