Using Airline Ticket Stubs for Identity Theft...or Worse...
An interesting story was published in the Guardian Unlimited on Wednesday, "Q. What could a boarding pass tell an identity fraudster about you? A. Way too much." So many little pieces of personal information floating around, and being tossed, it's really amazing how much can be done with seemingly innocuous papers...such as those airline ticket stubs.
The author of the article, Steve Boggan, indicated the stub contained the traveller's name, was a discarded British Airways boarding-pass stub, contained the seat number, indicated he was a "Gold" standard passenger and had the frequent-flyer number.
The article author took the stub to a security guru, Adam Laurie, logged on to the BA website, bought a ticket in the traveller's name and then, using the frequent flyer number on the boarding pass stub, without being required to submit a password, was given full access to all his personal details - including his passport number, the date it expired, his nationality and date of birth. The system also allowed them the opportunity to change the information.
They then used the information to find out on the Internet, within 15 minutes, where the traveller lived, who lived there with him, where he worked, the universities he had attended and how much his house was worth when he bought it.
Amazing...and scary...just a few pieces of seemingly innocent personal information can lead to so much...
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information security
airline ticket stubs
Capps II
identity cards
privacy
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