Kindsight in Action

The video below shows a scenario where a consumer, we’ll call Taylor, thinks she has a secure computer, with up-to-date anti-virus software, the firewall enabled, and all applications and the operating system fully patched, but she still falls victim to an attack launched by a criminal looking to steal identities and other personal information.

Criminals can attack home computers to steal identities

Unaware of what is about to happen, Taylor clicks on a sponsored link called Get Adobe Reader that she thinks is to the real Adobe site but, unfortunately, it is actually a poisonous web site created by the criminal that cleverly conceals the download and activation of an infection called a Remote Access Trojan.

This infection first disables the anti-virus software, while making it appear to be still on, and then creates a connection over the Internet to the attacker’s computer without the victim knowing. Even though up-to-date anti-virus software is running on the computer and the operating system and applications are also up-to-date, there is no notification to anyone that an attack has occurred.

However, the criminal now has complete access to the computer and can download files such as photos or documents containing personal information. With no idea that the computer has been attacked, Taylor goes online to do some banking assuming that all communications with the banking site is secure since it’s encrypted. Instead, the criminal activates a keylogger that captures everything Taylor types into the browser, before it is encrypted, including username and password.

By the time Taylor realizes she has been hacked, it’s too late as her identity and money have already been stolen and she’s left with the difficult task of trying to recover the funds and her identity.

Internet users need an additional layer of protection

With the Kindsight Identity Theft Protection service, this would be a different story. Providing an additional layer of protection against online threats, the Kindsight service detects threats in Internet traffic, sends alerts and shows users step-by-step how to remove threats that put their personal information at risk.

One can think of Kindsight as an identity theft “burglar alarm”. If it detects the presence of an online threat (i.e. break-in) that was missed by the security software (i.e. burglar picked the lock on the door), it will send you an alert (i.e. sound the alarm) to ensure your personal information stay safe. In the event of an alert, you are given step-by-step instructions to fix the problem.