Hackers go to great lengths to get a copy of people’s confidential personal information – passport, driving licence, credit card details, bank details, logins and passwords etc. because these can be sold to scammers for a lot of money.
For example, typical values are below:-
- Credit and debit card details of US citizens sell for $5 to $30 depending on the bank balance etc.
- Credit and debit card details of UK citizens sell for $20 to $35
- Bank login/password sells for $190 for a balance above $2,200
- Bank login/password for UK bank accounts sell for $700 – $900
- Login/password for Paypal sells for $20 – $300 depending on the balance
- Login/password for Netflix sells for $0.55
(data is from a report by McAfee)
You can see how a hacker who can get access to this information for a lot of people can make a lot of money. Your confidential information is worth a lot to a hacker but a great deal more to you to keep it safe.
Do not publish anything confidential on social media or similar and do not give out such information to a caller unless you are sure who it is.
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