Privacy Pandemic: How Cybercriminals Determine Targets, Attack Identities, and Violate Privacy-and How Consumers, Companies, and Policymakers Can Fight Back

by Christopher A. Smith

Overview

After mounting red flags caused Chris Smith to end a close relationship, he found his digital life under attack: accounts were compromised, emails and texts were intercepted, his social security number was stolen, and his mother's home Wi-Fi router was breached.

Chris would soon learn that cybercriminals had targeted him in one of the most extensive, twisted cases of digital identity theft known to experts. He discovered that he wasn't alone, but rather another casualty of the Information Age plague that continues to threaten the finances and digital safety of individuals, companies, and governments worldwide.

Once he recovered from the shock and betrayal, he assembled a comprehensive team of attorneys, digital forensics specialists, and law enforcement agents and vowed to bring his attackers to justice.

As Chris discovered when he tried to hold his attackers accountable, keeping vital personal information safe in the digital age is incredibly difficult. Privacy Pandemic is not only a firsthand account of what happens when one is targeted by sophisticated cybercriminals—it's also a guide for readers on how to stay safe in a dangerous digital world.

Chris details the companies, software, tools, and practices that give us all the best chance of preventing security breaches and their disastrous consequences, and shares how he's turned hardship into triumph, ensuring the power to protect personal information as much as possible is where it belongs: in the hands of each of us.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781645433934
Publisher:	Amplify Publishing
Publication date:	11/07/2023
Pages:	304
Sales rank:	1,154,188
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

A tech-savvy strategist in digital media and emerging technologies, Christopher A. Smith has garnered an unparalleled reputation for building, launching, and redeveloping highly successful companies with records that consistently reflect double-digit growth. His expertise includes creating strategic global partnerships, defining go-to-market strategies, galvanizing sales, spurring product development, and leading global teams within both start-ups and global organizations.

While he was an executive at a cryptocurrency firm, Chris became the target of significant and life-altering digital identity theft. Fueled by this experience, Chris founded DFend, a next-generation security service for developers, enterprise security professionals, and consumers to protect their digital assets and identities. Chris's passion and purpose are to make the digital world a safer place, reducing others' risk of becoming victims of similar crimes. This is his driving force when defending companies and consumers with disruptive technology. Chris was born and raised in San Mateo, California, and resides in New York City. Privacy Pandemic is his first book.

Editorial Reviews

2023-11-02
Tech entrepreneur and author Smith considers the growing threat of cybercrime and offers ways to respond to it, personally and politically.

In 2018, the author was targeted by what he calls a “relentless band of identity thieves” who wreaked years of havoc on his financial life. Fortunately, as a tech-firm professional, he had the knowledge and resources to fight back against them, but it still took five years of effort, and exacted an emotional toll. As online connectivity becomes a principal feature of modern life, the author says, people are increasingly vulnerable to identify theft, and the problem is only worsened by the negligence of the “profit-obsessed corporations” that have become the “custodians of our private lives.” Identity theft scams are on the rise; in 2020, Smith notes, they collectively led to $56 billion in losses for consumers. He astutely recommends a diverse anti-cybercrime approach that includes legislation that protects consumer data more robustly, the elimination of Social Security numbers, and wider adoption of secure blockchain technology. However, the crux of the problem, he says, is a general lack of personal vigilance: “Cybercriminals, specifically hackers, play on our very human weakness, carelessness, or trust to take advantage of us. Because they know they’re running a scam and we don’t, that information asymmetry gives them the advantage.” This book is remarkably thorough, and Smith devotes most of it to equipping readers with methods to protect their data and respond to breaches that will almost inevitably occur, no matter how vigilant they are. He covers a wide range of ways to avoid the “self-sabotage” upon which criminals rely, and he conveys it all in clear language that will be accessible even to those who aren’t tech-savvy. Sometimes he resorts to the sort of incendiary language that one associates with infomercials (“You can’t fight a war if you don’t know your enemy, and make no mistake, we’re all at war”), and the book does indeed conclude with the author advocating his own data-protection firm, DFend. Nonetheless, this is an impressively helpful guide.

A comprehensive resource for those looking to protect themselves from identity theft.

Kirkus Reviews