Hajar Azrioual

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identity-theft

Internet has simplified our lives in so many ways. Years ago people didn’t had a lot of the benefits that we currently have. For instance, doing research about a scientific topic can be done by reading articles from google scholar or other websites. Back in the days, people needed to go to the library to search for a certain book where the theory is discussed. Even looking up a simple word to know the definition is easier for us today then couple of years ago.

A form of internet that we currently use a lot are the electronic markets. Everything is being sold on the internet. Clothes, cars, electronics et cetera, everything can be found on the net. There are also platforms on the internet where people can sell their own products to other people. Focussing on these market, we know that it is very convenient to buy or sell products on these platforms. But is it reliable? According to the Crime Complaint Centre there were more than 70,000 complaints made about the online private market US.

More specifically, in the Netherland 3% of the population had experience with fraud on the internet. A lot of people bought products but were never delivered. Other people don’t receive products that meets their desired requirements. There are different types of fraud:

– Non-delivery fraud: Customer who paid for a certain product don’t receive their products

– Identity theft: Customers fill in their personal information. The identity of the customers will be stolen for criminal purposes.

And there are a lot of other types of fraud where people complain about. The question that we need to ask our self is; ‘What can we do about it?’

There has been a lot of research done about the possible solutions against internet fraud. A solution is for customers to never give their personal information to obscure websites. Another solution is to use anti-fraud software that warns users before they enter a website which is not safe.

Do you guys think that fraud in the online market can be prevented?

http://smallbusiness.chron.com/types-internet-fraud-work-61078.html

https://tweakers.net/nieuws/92095/cbs-3-procent-bevolking-opgelicht-bij-kopen-en-verkopen-via-internet.html

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Our participation on the internet has increased a lot the last couple of years. Everyone is making use of social networks like Facebook, Instagram, twitter et cetera. Initially these social networks are being used to stay in touch with our friends and family. Letting them know what keeps us busy in our daily lives. Are you going out with your friends? Let’s post that on Facebook! Are you going to travel to an exotic destination? Let’s post the pictures on Instagram! Do you have any doubts or are you irritated by some political decision? No worries, on twitter you can go on blast about anything. You can even hashtag your irritation in the hope it will be a trending topic.

Did you ever question yourself why these social networks are craving for your information? No? Well, here it comes:

Facebook is the pioneer of al social networks. With each click on a like button the corporation collects your entire browsing activities. Using it for a commercial purpose. A small example are the cookies. Believe me, cookies are delicious, but this one has a bitter taste to it. The cookie that Facebook uses is in the form of a text file that can track user activities. Did you for example looked for some Adidas sneakers on Zalando? And not even a minute later you scroll down your feeds on Facebook and what do you see? Indeed, an advertisement of Zalando about Adidas sneakers. For a lot of people it is unnoticed that these activities are caused by the cookies in their browser. Facebook makes effectively use of your information. The biggest revenue income for Facebook is advertisement with a percentage of 76%. The revenue income increased with 45% in regards to the previous year. All due to your online posts.

But not only online post are a way to generate our information to these corporations. Even the supermarket around the corner is trying to influence your buying behaviour. Let’s take Target as an example. This supermarket uses ID cards for each customer. These ID cards are tied with some personal information of the customer such as a creditcard number, address, e-mail address and the name of the customer. Each time the customer buys products the information is being saved so a team of analytics can study the data. The objective of these data analytics is to make predictions about a certain target audience. For instance, pregnant woman. With the data that Target already had they made a prediction that a teenage girl was pregnant. With the information on her ID card they sended baby supplies advertisement to her address on her name. Her father was furious, because he thought that Target was promoting teenpregancy. He went to the store and demanded to talk to the Manager. The manager did not know why the advertisement were send and apologized. After a few days the manager called the father to apologize again. The father said to the manager that his daughter turned out to be pregnant.

Just imagine how far people can go with analysing your information. You choose to put your information out there. Do you think that you should earn something out of the billions of dollars that are being made by these corporations?

Source:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-was-pregnant-before-her-father-did/#1e3d553e34c6

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34776191

Internet Fraud

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