Identity Fraud

Identity fraud by criminals can occur through various forms of data theft. In addition to generally careless handling of personal information, common ways criminals initiate identity fraud include phishing attacks and malware infections.

Criminals can use personal information (e.g., names, addresses, photos, information about frequent contacts) to impersonate another existing person online. This is often done to establish trust with new victims and cause greater damage. However, stolen credentials can also allow criminals to make purchases in your name, access cloud files, register/deregister for exams, or send emails in your name, for example.

While identity fraud may not be directly targeted by criminals to cause financial harm or damage to their victims' systems, their access to personal information should be avoided. Criminals can sell any form of personal information for sometimes large amounts of money. Thus, your personal information becomes the criminals' profit.

Therefore, always be careful about what information you disclose, especially on social networks. Always pay attention to your privacy settings on social media so that criminals are not able to gather too many personal information and recreate your profile in great detail.

  • CEO Fraud

    The CEO Fraud is a crime in which the identity of an executive is stolen in order to persuade employees to commit harmful actions. The attackers gather information about executives (e.g., via public websites), impersonate them, and take advantage of their supposed position of authority. Employees are tricked into disclosing internal information, making money transfers, or even installing malware, for example.

  • How do you detect identity theft?

    Often, identity fraud is not noticed until the information is abused by criminals. Unusual activity on online services, such as password changes you did not make yourself, unexpected changes in settings, or tips from third parties, can be indicators of misuse. In the event of a possible identity fraud, react immediately to avoid further damage!

    To find out how you can detect whether the person you are dealing with is possibly misusing someone else's identity, read the section on social engineering.