Truth 21 Gift card or gift horse?

When I was growing up, my parents would tell me the old adage, “If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.” Generally, these words of wisdom would be offered after I just got done telling them how I was going to make a million dollars by getting involved in one pyramid scheme or another that one of my friends had already fallen for. Of course, my parents were always right, and my friends always lost their money. As I have grown older and hopefully slightly wiser, I find myself using these same words when I speak to others about identity theft. “If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.”

The setup

As with many forms of identity theft, it all starts in a seemingly familiar way. You check your mailbox, ...

Get The Truth About Identity Theft now with the O’Reilly learning platform.

O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.