Corporate Role in Protecting Consumers from the Risk of Identity Theft

Abstract

The Internet has made it possible for users to be robbed of their reputation, money and credit worthiness by the click of a mouse. The impact of identity theft severely limits victims’ ability to participate in commerce, education and normal societal functions. This paper evaluates resurgence in syndicated cyber attacks, which includes but not limited to identity theft, corporate espionage and cyber warfare taking advantage of the Internet as a medium of operations. The paper highlights the increase of cyber related attacks in the past ten years due to lack of transatlantic international corporation between participating countries, coherent information security policies, data aggregation and sound international laws to facilitate prosecution of perpetrators. The cyber space coupled with availability of free hacking tools has contributed to resurgence in syndicated identity theft, corporate espionage and identity theft by organized crime elements taking advantage of the Internet as a medium of operations. This paper presents conclusive solution that users, organizations and consumers can enact to protect themselves from the threat of cyber attacks culminating into identity theft, financial loss or both.