Risk & Business

Image via Wikipedia According to an article in The Telegraph , an online UK website/newspaper, identity theft has risen by more than a third in that country. Based upon information provided by the article, there have been a total of 59,000 recorded victims of identity theft in Great Britain in the first nine months of the year whereas last year the total for the whole year was 62,658. The article went into further detail explaining that account takeovers , 3rd party hacks into an existing account have more than tripled in the last 2 years. The targets of these attacks are credit cards by more than half with the blame being online purchasing and cardholder carelessness being blamed. As a business owner it's more than likely that you and your employees are making online payments and or purchases using company credit. It would be wise to consult your insurance agent to discuss procuring coverage for this type of risk if you don't already have it.

Image via Wikipedia I recently read an insurance industry article titled "Lessons from and equipment thief" , and they discussed what would probably be tips from thieves, if they were that forthcoming, regarding the theft of contractor's equipment stored overnight at job sites. According to the article, thieves most fear being caught when stealing, storing or moving equipment. The risk of being caught while selling the equipment is low because frequently equipment owners forget to record serial numbers and buyers of used equipment tend not to check titles. The article also referenced the pointless setting up of security procedures that are too complex or not regularly checked since thieves tend to watch and wait until security starts to become lax. Another factor would be employees of the contractor. They are the ones usually responsible for the implementation of security and it is key to give them incentives to help with this responsibility. Lastly, and perhaps ...