...Homeland Security defines” personally identifiable information (PII) as any information that permits the identity of an individual to be directly or indirectly inferred, including any information that is linked or linkable to that individual, regardless of whether the individual is a U.S. citizen, legal permanent resident, visitor to the U.S., or employee or contractor to the Department.” (Callahan, 2012). Some Personally identifiable information that can be used to cause harm on their own are social security number, driver’s license number, password number, alien registration number, etc. Other PII that can be used to cause harm when combined with other information are: name, email address, home address, date of birth, last 4 digits of social security number, mother’s maiden name, account passwords, phone number etc. There are numerous ways to combine someone’s information and gain access to private information. Unfortunately most PII are not difficult to get access to, because these information are use in everyday activities. Whether it is the doctor’s office that basically has all PII on a person or the lawyers office or a store that a credit card was used to purchase something or the car dealership that copies driver’s license before a test drive. Regrettably, most of these businesses does not know how to protect PII, therefore does not train there staff accordingly. Businesses or reckless in protecting customers PII by; mishandling, leaving the information in un lock cabinets...
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...Personal Identifiable Information in Today’s Age Problem Statement Personal Identifiable Information (PII) is sensitive data of a person’s identity. If mishandled, this information can result in identity theft. There have been millions of consumers who have had their identity compromised from misuse or lost PII. To adequately protect PII, one must understand what it is. PII is information that can distinguish or trace a person identity. A few examples such as, a person’s Social Security number, age, home and office phone numbers are forms of PII. While the Social Security card is a distinctive document linking a person’s name and Social Security number, when associated with other forms of PII, as previously mentioned, it creates a high risk to the individual and eventually can lead to identity theft (Department of Defense, 2012). To assist consumers with identity theft government officials have established a Task Force and initiated several Acts to protect consumers. End Personal Identifiable Information in Today’s Age Information in today’s age is becoming easily accessible to many people. The Internet is just one resource that can provide information about a person. Internet search engines, such as Google provide a wealth of information, if used properly about a person. It is vital for the public and private sector to be aware and protect critical information from unwanted hands, if used illegally can cause damage to person’s identity. Besides search engines, social...
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...As defined by the U.S. General Services Administration personally identifiable information, or PII, is any information that can be used to distinguish or trace an individual’s identity, either alone or combined with other personal or identifying information that is linked or linkable to a specific individual (Personally Identifiable Information (PII), 2013). Some examples of PII would be names, social security numbers (full and truncated), driver’s license, identification cards, and medical records. According to the U.S. General Accounting Office, 87% of the U.S. population can be uniquely identified using only gender, date of birth, and zip code (Stringer, 2011). This is a pretty scary though seeing that this is all information that can be obtained from public sources. Protecting this information is essential to protecting yourself and your loved ones from having their identity compromised. Protecting your own information is the first step to ensuring that your information is safe. There are always going to be times that you have to divulge this information to certain types of companies but it’s about minimizing the people that have this information and securing it for yourself that can ultimately protect you. One of the most prominent threats that comes from the compromise of PII is identity theft. If someone who is looking to steal your identity gets a part of your PII then they would be able to use that information to not only collect more information about you, but they...
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...Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and Data Breaches By Stevie D. Diggs University Maryland University College IFSM201 Section 7974 Semester 1309 Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and Data Breaches Knowing and training on personally identifiable information (PII) is important in today’s society. There has been research on data breaches and identity theft that links them both together. This is to help personnel have a clear understanding on the impact of what is at steak and an explanation of PII. Many businesses and organizations have different definition for PII because of the classification of data for each, and that is why understanding PII is important. Examples of PII include, but are not limited to the following: full name, maiden name, mother‘s maiden name, or alias; personal identification number, social security number (SSN), passport number, driver‘s license number, taxpayer identification number, or financial account or credit card number; address information, street address or email address; personal characteristics, including photographic image, fingerprints, handwriting, or other biometric data. How do you protect PII? Who has access to PII? Who are affected by data breaches and identity theft? How to prevent data breaches and identity theft? The research introduced in this essay is from Verizon along with multiple articles involving military and organizations. PII is defined definitely by military and organizations. Training along with knowing...
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...PII And Ethics Research Paper Jadrrih PII is an abbreviation that stands for Personal Identifiable Information as used in information security. This is information that can be used to identify, contact or locate a single person. Ethics are the standards set in place in order to distinguish right from wrong. As important as PII is in the modern information technology, it has its advantage, disadvantage and ethical issues. PII comes in handy in modern technology. The most commonly used information to identify individuals are ID and drivers numbers, social security numbers, vehicles registration number, date of birth, biometrics, facial recognition to name a few. If PII did not exist, it would be incredibly hard to narrow down and individual since many people share names. There are some advantages that tie in with PII when it comes to the purpose of distinguishing individual identity. Big corporations find PII important identifying their employees. For example most companies have employee ID which is unique from one employee to another. Government officials need to use PII to search and identify and distinguish individuals in their large data base. For example, all legal US residences have a social security number that identifies an individual. In forensic, PII is important to help track down and identify criminals. This identity can be obtained through facial recognition and finger prints resulting in a selective revelation of one’s identity...
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...This lab assignment was very informative for me. One of the few labs I have done in a college atmosphere that made sense and I could use in the real world. Before starting this lab I knew that protecting your information was important, as well as securing your computer from prying eyes. I also knew to a certain point that information was kept on the computer about your what, when, who, how, and when, but what I did not know is at how thorough a program was as picking through and deciphering the information. What I do know now is that it is VERY important to delete, no to shred, as much PII on your computer as possible. Using the Identity Finder program opened my eyes to seeing how much residual information is stored throughout the computer. One should be very careful on when, where, and by what means Social Security Numbers, Date of Births, Telephone Numbers, Addresses, and Passwords...
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...Protect Your Information Personally identifiable information or PII defined by Department of Commerce as “Information which can be used to distinguish or trace an individual's identity, such as their name, social security number, biometric records, etc. alone, or when combined with other personal or identifying information which is linked or linkable to a specific individual, such as date and place of birth, mother’s maiden name, etc. (OMB Memorandum M-07-16, Note 1). The definition of PII is very broad and makes no distinction between “sensitive” and “non-sensitive” PII. Terms not specifically defined within this Memorandum (e.g., sensitive) should be considered to reflect the definition found in a commonly accepted dictionary. (OMB Memorandum M-07-16, Note 7). Examples include direct references such as name, address, social security number, and e-mail address. It also includes any information that could be used to reference other data elements that are used for identification, such as gender, race, and date of birth.” This has been around for a very long time, it can cover many topics for example employee monitoring, information privacy, (the biggest) identity theft, etc. Every single topic mentioned go hand and hand in a general converstion of PII. I wonder from time to time where does my information go, who hands it in, are they responsible, how can I trust that anonymous person? These questions can go on forever and ever but, I can worry less about my information now...
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...fraudulently each year with financial losses totaling upwards of $50 billion.” (Douglas, 2012) By securing someone else’s personally identifiable information (PII), a criminal with enough knowledge about the Internet could illegally gain access to medical records, bank accounts, and many other aspects of the unknowing victim’s life. This is why protecting one’s personally identifiable information is paramount in avoiding identity theft. There are many methods criminals can use to acquire PII but there are many ways one can protect their information as well. It is easier to protect PII by practicing several simple habits rather than forfeiting time, effort, and potentially large sums of money after one’s identity has been compromised. The United States Department of Justice suggests several easy tips to help avoid becoming a victim of identity theft. Individuals should be stingy about releasing their PII to anyone they do not know or trust. (Identity Theft And Identity Fraud, 2014) It is common to receive phone calls or emails that are offering the sale of a product, donations, or credit card offers. Many of these calls or emails are legitimate and there is no danger involved, but it is important to remain vigilant when placed in these situations. Criminals who are phishing will often use techniques to secure an individual’s PII while posing as a legitimate organization. Many times the victims in these...
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...access and some talent. Potentiating this problem is the large legitimate market of information brokers that gather marked amounts of information today. This allows for the integration of legal identifiable information to augment those criminal activities. From far away places like Russia, Belarus and Nigeria, scores of criminal associations scour the Internet in search of information and opportunities to be used in identity theft, malware insertion or extortion through complete denial of service (DOS), (Higgins, 2008). The Bigger They are… the Harder They Fall Most of us have seen it in the news, “Veterans Administration loses Personally Identifiable Information (PII)”, “Bank of America (BOA) loses account numbers” etc… At first it seems minor but after investigation it turns out to be large amounts of PII lost (O’Brien, 2008). The criminals focus on big companies (mostly point of sale functions) as they are the slowest to adapt to change and they have the largest pay back for the effort expended (secondary to high volume sales). My own company had thousands of personal records lost requiring a large investigation. Thousands of non-value-added man-hours lost to work a problem that shouldn’t have happened. For a fraction of the man-hour cost we could have prevented the catastrophe from initially happening. Big companies are going...
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... Question 1: Describe each business in terms of its market, strategy, business model, or distinctive competence. History: Polaris Industries and Arctic Cat Polaris Industries was founded by Edgar Hateen in 1952 in the town of Roseau, Minnesota and introduced the world’s first Snowmobile (at that time called a Sno Traveler) in 1957. In 1962, Polaris officially declared itself the world’s first Snowmobile Company and reported nearly $800,000 in sales. For the next several decades, Polaris would expand greatly in the worldwide production and sales of Snowmobiles and after ownership under Textron in the 1960’s and 1970’s Polaris was back in the hands of its employees and went public in the year 1986 under the stock ticker PII. It’s first ATV rolled off the production line in 1985, and business quickly expanded into the popular watercraft market of the 1990s. Today, with over $2.5B in sales, Polaris Industries is the world’s largest producer of Off-Road Vehicles, holds the number one position in market share of snowmobiles, and currently is the second largest retailer of Heavy-Weight Motorcycles (1400cc+) in the world under the brand names of Victory and Indian Motorcycles. Polaris has dealerships, distributors and subsidiaries in 110 countries around the world selling its product through numerous channels. The North American structures operates through a sales channel of over 1200 independent dealerships, while international operations primarily consist of distributors...
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...the first thing you will want to look at is the placement of the initial server(s). If the server is going to be placed within the bank itself, as the LAN is presently, what kind of physical security will be used? Limiting unauthorized access to this data and information stored on these servers is very important as the risk of PII and Bank proprietary information being used is protected constantly. How will the server be accessed and who will be monitoring the access to the designated server. The next thing to take a look at will be what kind of operating system will be run on the server and what levels of security are available in the server OS to ensure security of the designated servers for the application. Next item that needs to be addressed is the understanding of the network topology, since we are going to be working with an application that gives access to information that is not for general viewing. Placement of the servers and minimizing the Public side of the application network (the internet) is another security concern, this means not placing the complete database outside of the intranet and in direct contact with the internet. Placement of servers in a DMZ that limits information that is available to the public side will greatly improve the protection of PII and keeping the security of PII, Proprietary information, and other sensitive information secure. Finally, hacking is also another high risk concern that this assessment needs to be taken into consideration...
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...Literature Review BRM 1 Abstract This paper seeks to identify the customer’s preferences, behavior and shift of behavior in the Chinese food market and how they can influence foreign companies’ marketing strategy. This literature review shows that, pushed by a multitude of factors, the Chinese food consumption and food consumer’s behavior have strongly changed over the past 10 years, both in quantity and quality demand, creating a lot of opportunities for foreign companies. Moreover, the Chinese cultural background and preferences are identified as playing an important role in the willingness to buy (WTB) and shopping habits which prompts for a more adaptive approach of marketing. Introduction In the past decade, China has seen a lot of both positive and negative factors influence its food consumption and its society as a whole. Three main socio-economic factors are identified by the previous literature. Urbanization has been growing fast, more than 50% of the population lived in urban areas and it is expected to reach 75% by 2035. Moreover, the average income has been continuously rising and contributes to the growth of the middle upper class granting an easier access to goods. Finally, the demand or the need for imported goods rocketed, fueled by the recurring food scandals. (Gale, Hansen, Jewison, 2014) This evolution largely contributed in turning the Chinese food market, now the largest in the world, into a very attractive potential market for foreign...
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...interests (Kim et al., 2012; Tuluc, 2012). Kim et al., (2012) observed that there has been a tremendous rise in the threats of malicious attacks globally—a appreciable increase of 71% between 2008 and 2009 was noted. A specie and very popular scam is Phishing and Identity Theft (IDT). This type of online crime is a fraudulent scheme whereby attackers invade the victims’ privacy and obtain their personally identifying information (PII) such as credit card numbers, CVV numbers, credit card reports, social security numbers, drivers license numbers (usually used in gaining short-term driving jobs), telephone calling cards, ATM card details, Mortgage details, date of birth details, passwords, PIN numbers, etc. (Hedayati, 2012). These details are used by online criminals to perpetrate larceny against their victims who may have compromised their PIIs through social engineering—a preliminary attack technique used by the attackers to trick victims into compromising such details to the criminals (Hedayati, 2012). Over the past decade, a well over 500 million of PIIs belonging to the United States residents kept and stored in various corporate or government and other institutional databases have been found to be stolen or lost to these criminals through privacy breaches (Douglas, 2013). According to Gartner Group, losses associated with phishing and ID theft suffered by US banks...
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...Security Numbers, is stored by various companies, organizations, and the Federal Government. So in 1974 the United States realized it was storing lots of personal information on its citizens and enacted the privacy act of 1974, in which it states that “no agency will disclose any record which is contained in a system of records by any means of communication to any person, or to another agency, except pursuant to a written request by, or with the prior written consent of, the individual to whom the record pertains” So how can we protect ourselves, they’ll always be someone out to obtain your information. The Definition to (PII) according to the Department of Labor website is- “Any representation of information that permits the identity of an individual to whom the information applies to be reasonably inferred by either direct or indirect means. Further, PII is defined as information: (i) that directly identifies an individual (e.g., name, address, social security number or other identifying number or code, telephone number, email address, etc.) or (ii) by which an agency intends to identify specific individuals in conjunction with other data elements, i.e., indirect identification. (These data elements may include a combination of gender, race, birth date, geographic indicator, and other descriptors). Additionally, information permitting the physical or online contacting of a specific individual is the same as personally identifiable information. This information can be maintained...
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...class we were about to receive. I looked at the roster and was horrified. It was a roster of the entire battalion, 1000 or so Marines, with their names and COMPLETE social security numbers (SSN’s) on it. I brought it to the attention to the Staff Sergeant (SSgt) and he said he would change it for the following days training. The FOLLOWING DAY! I, being a Cpl at the time, and the lower ranking said, “SSgt this isn’t something that can wait a day”. I was ignored and the days training went on as scheduled. It wasn’t until we were receiving our annual training on Personally Identifiable Information (PII) that I absolutely lost it on these rosters that were circulating. How could we be about to receive training on how to protect Marines PII when such a PII violation was taking place? Luckily, a Colonel was in the back of the training theatre and had final had enough of what was transpiring. He...
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