Funny story of the day…

Ever heard of LifeLock? They describe themselves as an “Identity Theft Protection” service. LifeLock put out a commercial where the CEO hands out his social security number to random people on the street, and puts it on billboards, sides of trucks, etc. Never seen it? Check out the commercial here on YouTube.

Turns out, the whole service is a scam.

An article in the Charleston Gazette, “ID theft protection firm sued” is an unfortunate story for those affected by LifeLock’s claims of protection. However, quite a few parts of the article had me laughing out loud. LifeLock’s CEO’s social security number,  457-55-5462, has been used over 20 times to fraudulently obtain driver’s licenses! Oh, and his credit profile has been so abused that the birth date associated with his Social Security number has been changed to Nov. 2, 1940. I wonder if he gets presents on both days?

Here’s a few of the other highlights from the article:

• That $1 million guarantee? No such thing.
• Individuals can use the same services for free, that LifeLock charges them for.
• LifeLock doesn’t pay for customers’ credit reports. Instead, they use the customer’s information to request their free annual credit report, essentially preventing the individual from requesting these documents on their own.
• The pièce de résistance - in Wisconsin, a woman’s debit card was stolen, and that thief used that card to sign up for LifeLock.

Filed under: Identification, Legal, Privacy, Security