Learn How To Protect Yourself From Identity Theft and Mobile Hacking 1of2 @McAfeeConsumer

Anderson, now Emmy nominated for Outstanding Talk Show and Host. Today on Anderson, identity theft, our experiment exposes new danger.

What could have happened just in the last couple hours?

By now your bank account would be empty.

Today's show is really important because there are a whole bunch of scams right now that crooks are using to steal your identity and steal money from you. To be honest, you know, when I in general hear stories about identity theft, I kind of tune them out lately because I feel like I've been hearing about it for years. I know all about it. I actually had my identity stolen years ago by a baggage handler at a New York airport. So anyone who flew into a New York airport today, I want to check your bags. They actually stole a checkbook from my luggage. But that was old-school stealing. The new stealing is incredibly high-tech, and the new scams could be happening to you right now. So that's why we're doing the show today, because a lot of these scams that we're going to expose today, I had never even heard of them before. We started doing this research. The tips we're gonna give you in just the next few minutes can save you thousands of dollars and years of work trying to get your identity back. In fact, we've tricked a number of people in the audience today. They don't even know about it yet. We've already managed to gain access to very personal information of a number of people in this audience. Uh, don't worry, we're not gonna be using it against you or anything. But if we can do it, believe me, crooks can as well. So in the next few minutes, you're gonna learn the top 10 newest scams and how to avoid them. Take a look.

Identity theft. It's one of the fastest-growing crimes in the United States, affecting more than 11 million Americans in the last year alone. It can happen anywhere, anytime. Identity thieves can strike in seconds, leaving years of damage to your credit, your money, and your name. Credit card and bank accounts are no longer the only targets. In 2010, thieves stole the medical records of 5 million Americans. And since 2008, almost a half million have fallen fallen prey to identity tax fraud, where thieves steal your Social Security number and then rob you of your refund. The new identity thieves use sophisticated and devious methods to strike in the most unsuspecting ways. After receiving a frantic call from her grandson Matthew, Ann Warren didn't hesitate to offer her help.

He said, "They want $2,400, Grandma. I know it's an awful lot of money, but can you please, please—

and don't tell anybody." Convinced he was jailed in Spain after a car accident, Ann She wired the money, but more calls and desperate pleas for cash kept coming.

It was my grandson's voice. I'm not going to deny my grandson. I'm going to help him.

More than $4,800 later, Ann learned she'd been scammed by someone overseas pretending to be Matthew. Authorities believe someone accessed Matthew's Facebook page, gathered personal information, and from a video sampled his voice and mannerisms, all enough to scam a concerned grandmother.

Though Anne is here with her grandson Matthew, also joining us is security expert Robert Siciliano. Uh, basically, how— somebody called you up and saying that your grandson had been in trouble in Spain, correct?

No, the phone call was from Matthew. I answered the phone and he said, "Hi Grandma, I bet you don't know where I am.

I'm in Barcelona, Grandma." And you were sure it was his voice?

It was his voice. They said, they said, "Grandma, I had an accident. I hit a pole and they took me to the police station. I went before a judge and he cited me for reckless driving." So how much money did you give over complete, totally? $4,857 with the transfer fees.

Wow.

So this is, this is the scam, Robert. How does a scam like this get pulled off? I don't understand how this works.

Anderson, this has been going on for quite some time, decades. Now with social media, The bad guy gets the intelligence through your Facebook page. They find out your name, your maiden name, your phone number, and then who your relatives are. Once they get a hold of your grandson, they go to his page, they look up his information, what his pets are, where he might be traveling to, and then they model his voice, pose as him, and next thing you know, she's wiring money overseas.

So in our top 10 list of, of top 10 scams, we're calling this the Disguised Phone Call Scam. And we wanted to see how easy it is to scam someone using a disguised phone call. Where's Agatha and Sandy?

Over here?

All right, let me come over here. So, um, how's it going? Nice to meet you. Here, stand on up. So now, have you met Bonnie over here? Bonnie, here, stand up. How are you? Nice to see you, Bonnie.

Hi, thank you.

Hey, have you met Bonnie?

No.

No, have you ever seen her before in your life? So Bonnie has been working with us to see how easy it is to scam someone using this disguised phone call. So even though you think you've never met Bonnie, you've actually supplied your Social Security number to Bonnie already over the telephone. Take a look.

First, Bonnie logs onto Facebook, where she finds the person she'll impersonate, Agatha. Agatha is the perfect target. Her Facebook page has no privacy settings. She shares personal information, photos, and even videos where Agatha's voice is recorded.

Hey, smile to the camera.

Bonnie listens to it over and over, studying Agatha's voice.

Hey, hey, smile to the camera. Smile to the camera.

Next, Bonnie picks a friend from Agatha's Facebook page and then uses a website that allows her to call that friend using a fake caller ID. Bonnie programs in Agatha's number so the caller ID will show up as Agatha. Now the scam will be even more believable. Then it's showtime.

Hello? It's Agatha.

Yeah, I know.

Can you hear me?

Aggie, I'm in my room.

Hi, I know. Sorry, sorry. Yeah, they called me from Anderson, and we actually might be on TV. And so they want us— like, we have to sign a release and everything, and they need our social. Can you give me your social?

5-1-—

OK, great. I'm going to call them back. Thanks.

OK, bye.

OK, bye.

That was too easy.

So, Sandy, you gave your Social Security number to Bonnie here. You thought it was Agatha. It sounded like Agatha to you?

Yes.

Agatha did.

Really?

Yes.

And you, Agatha, bless your heart, have posted so much information about yourself online that Bonnie could just get all this information about you. Robert, what can we take away from this?

Well, number 1, do not trust caller ID. Caller ID can easily be spoofed, meaning they can actually change the phone number that shows up on your phone thinking it's a friend or a family member. That's first and foremost.

Uh, Anne, so, I mean, you wired nearly $5,000 to these people before you figured out this was a scam. What kind of an impact has this had on you?

Well, it was my personal stash that I was going to use to take a vacation to Bali for maybe my last hurrah. But now I'm going to start saving again. And my son said, and my grandson have said, You're gonna do it too, Grandma.

Matthew, what's this been like for you? I mean, do you—

I felt really guilty at first. My dad called me on the phone and was asking me about this, or, "You should call Grandma. She's worried about you." So I called and I found out what had happened, and I felt terrible. Like, I felt like this was my fault that all this was going on using my identity. But the first thing I did was call my other grandfather and let him know that Hey, if this thing is going around, then just be aware.

I had no idea that this scam was even in existence. I want you to meet Todd Davis, the CEO of the security company LifeLock. Todd, thanks very much for being here. Thanks, David. So what did you want to say to Ann?

Well, so Ann, first of all, my heart is broken for you that you fell victim to one of these scams doing what you thought was right for your grandson. But I got to tell you, I am so impressed with your courage to be willing to come out and tell this story so there aren't tremendous number of other victims that fall to this kind of scam. So Anderson, I think we want to work with you to make this right.

Yeah.

So please, let's do that.

Well, we decided with LifeLock's help, and we've been able to get you the money that you lost and to give you back the money that you lost so that you'll be able to finally take that trip.

LifeLock helped.

Thank you.

Appreciate that. Appreciate that from LifeLock. So number 2 on our list On our list of ID scams is something called smishing. Robert, what is smishing?

Smishing is when the bad guy sends you a text message, an SMS message, and once you click that infected link, you download malware, malicious software, onto your mobile device, software that essentially allows the bad guy from anywhere in the world to remotely control your phone just like you were using your phone.

So we sent 32 people in our audience, in this audience right now, a text with a link in it last night. Here's the scary part: 4 of you, 4 of those people, actually clicked on that link. We're not going to identify them here, embarrass them, but 4 people clicked on that link. So that was just a test. If we really had been scammers, Robert, what could have happened to those people just in the last couple hours?

Well, essentially game over. You know, they would have had full, complete remote control over your device, and by now your bank account essentially would be emptied.

Uh, we've good news for folks in the audience today. McAfee Mobile Security wants to help everyone in our audience keep their mobile phones safe, so they're gonna give everybody in this audience a year subscription of mobile phone protection. Uh, and you can log on to AndersonCooper.com right now for your chance to win a subscription for yourself. Coming up, new ways that virtual thieves are tricking you into handing over your credit card information electronically without you even knowing about it. And as we go to break, here's ID scam number 3, fake emails. We'll be right back.