Cyber Security Seminar Offers Guidance to Avoid Identity The

In the studio, samantha lantz, 18 news.

Chemung canal trust company stopped by the steele memorial library in elmira today to educate the community on how to protect yourself against identity theft and fraudulent behavior.

18 news reporter, ryan ruff has the story.

Identity theft is not to be taken lightly.

In fact, javelin strategy and research indicated that 15 billion dollars were stolen from 13.1 million people last year.

Therefore, the chemung canal trust company held an educational seminar to help prevent identity theft or provide assistance to those who feel they are already in danger.

Effectively communicating with your bank, may be the most important step.

Jennifer tiffany: "check their bank statements regularly, make sure those transactions are theirs.

Report any lost or stolen items directly to their bank or credit card companies immediately.

All these things, your bank is only here to help you.

So always be open and honest and talk to them about it."

Hackers and cyber thieves often resort to tactical deception or phishing as a means of obtaining your critical banking information.

Patrick mcfarland: "phishing is a psychological process where people try to instill trust in you in order to gain your personally identifiable information."

One critical feature to avoid phishing and identity theft is to maintain complex, but memorable passwords.

Jennifer tiffany: "more lengthy passwords are better.

Upper case, lower case, special characters, not using your last name, not using your address, not using anything that is going to be something that someone is already going to know about you."

This cyber security seminar marks just one event of an entire series of community conversations with the chemung canal trust company.

Patrick mcfarland: "this is, i believe the fifth cyber security seminar that we are doing.

With more to come, this is kind of an ongoing presentation to the community to help raise awareness."

In october and november, the community conversation series will highlight basic investing and financial planning for retirement.

Reporting