Another Capitulation To Paranoia
Posted on | April 24, 2005 at 5:51 pm | 9 Comments
Today I bought something that five years ago I never would’ve thought I’d be buying. I bought a paper shredder. No home should be without one! Ah, what does it say about our society when we feel we need to shred every piece of paper we get (not to mention old credit cards and CD-Rs), just so that someone doesn’t stumble onto some personal information that can be used against us or to steal our identities? The part of me that trusts in the inherent goodness of human nature is appalled that I have sunken to this level of distrust. But the part of me that likes seeing things torn to bits is saying “Cool!”.
The shredder came with a CD-ROM marked “I.D. Protection System”. I momentarily checked the shredder for a USB port or some other computer interface that would require a driver install, but could find none. I haven’t put the CD in the computer but it looks like a bunch of offers for various identity theft protection applications/services. Cross-marketing is such a wonderful thing, isn’t it?
Latre.
Comments
9 Responses to “Another Capitulation To Paranoia”
April 25th, 2005 @ 12:11 am
Well, I got a shredder about 5 years ago, so I guess I was ahead of the curve. But really, the necessity of a shredder isn’t so much an indictment of society and our crumbling morals but more of the preditory practices of the credit card industry, where even people’s dogs have been sent card offers. Since everyone who wants a credit card already has one, the only growth in the credit card business is identity theft. The credit card companies don’t care, they either get their money from the victims or the merchants the thieves bought from. They’re never left holding the bag.
The goverenment could clear up this identity theft problem pretty quickly by simply enacting a law that says that a person is not responsible for a dept unless the deptor (the credit card company or bank) can PROVE that the person entered into the dept, like with a thumbprint or photograph. I suspect that would stop the problem pretty much dead in its tracks.
April 25th, 2005 @ 7:55 am
But how would you do online transactions then?
April 25th, 2005 @ 4:11 pm
I’m currently engaged in a credit card fraud resolution process. I’m not sure who’s going to be left holding the bag for the fradulent charges, but I’m told it’s not gonna be me.
One interesting thing is that the charges appeared on a card that I use for exactly one recurring billing — no physical security breach was possible (so a shredder wouldn’t have helped).
April 25th, 2005 @ 6:38 pm
The cool part about a shredder is that you can make lots of confetti with it. It’s not so handy if you don’t have a balcony overlooking a major boulevard, but fortunately, we do.
My Mom has a shredder – buried underneath piles of crap. If you think you’re paranoid, imagine someone who saves her old prescription bottles because she’s concerned some Mexican street gang can use them for nefarious purposes… assuring her that A: rural Broomfield has few recognized Mexican street gangs; B: there aren’t many illicit uses for thyroid hormone on the black market, and C: you can’t get a prescription refill from an empty bottle anyway, does not really penetrate. Think about that next time you worry about “paranoia”.
April 25th, 2005 @ 10:10 pm
OK, I wasn’t talking about fraudulent charges on credit cards you already own, those charges can be resolved fairly easily and they’re easy to catch (you’ll see them on next months bill). The credit card owner generally never has to pay those. Your “customer copy” for those aren’t what you have to worry about shredding, after all, you give away your credit card number every time you hand it to a waitperson.
What you need to shred is all those credit card applications you get in the mail. People can (and do) steal those from your trash, apply for a card under your name (but with a different address) and rack up tons of charges under your name. The first you’ll hear about it is when the collection agencies start calling. Or someone will get a bank loan under your name. Or buy a car. Those are the things that people spend years trying convice the lenders that it wasn’t them and to clear off their credit records. Those are the things that I think the lenders should have to prove that it was you who signed up for them with some physical evidence.
As an aside, I’m actually hesitant about throwing out old prescription bottles myself. It’s not that I think some street gang’s going to use them, I just don’t like the idea someone seeing in my trash what drugs I take. It’s like someone pawing through your medicine cabinet.
April 25th, 2005 @ 10:58 pm
Good point about the applications. Those are definitely going in the shredder from now on.
April 26th, 2005 @ 9:50 am
In our apartment building, there’s a trash chute on each floor down which people can drop garbage bags. Now and then (at least weekly) some lazy doofus leaves a larger-than-normal item in the little closet where the door is located, instead of taking 30 whole seconds to go down the elevator and put it directly in the dumpsters in the parking garage below. Sometimes this even blocks the door, leading to piles of trash in the hallway (especially if it’s on a weekend, or the maintenance guy has been fired again). Occasionally, I find the time and inclination to poke around a bit – I find bank statements (with the address – apartment #338, I know you’re pigs!) and worse.
The lesson here is, just don’t be low-hanging fruit. I doubt dumpster-divers trawl the suburbs anyway, not when there’s money to be made in upscale (or at least pricey) areas with apartment buildings. Getting caught digging through trash can lead to jail unless you got a good explanation, and how much easier to come up with one next to an apartment building as opposed to in some quiet ‘burb with separate homes? And shredding can be overkill when all you may need to do, for instance in the case of credit card offers, is just rip ‘em in half and throw one half away at the post office and leave the other in the back of your car ’til spring cleaning (that is, if you use a PObox like I do).
That said, shredders can still be fun.
April 26th, 2005 @ 4:12 pm
I use my shredder for really really bad student papers…then I make them put the paper back together again in order to pass the class. BWAH-HA-HA-HA-HAHH!!
April 26th, 2005 @ 4:23 pm
Jeff, do you use a cross-cut or a strip-cut shredder? If it’s cross-cut, then you are truly, truly evil. Strip-cut, just slightly evil.