Ouch! But was all that damage done by bad guys who had no more than his name, address, and phone number?
Actually they started with a name and credit card number, but the loan application was in his name, SSN, and credit rating. Apparently they were able to mine the other data given the first two pieces of information.
Actually, I can afford to be sanguine because I've got little enough money and credit standing to not be at risk for either major bucks or major aggravation…not to mention the $1,000,000 identity theft protection I got as a result of the Target breach.
Hopefully you will never need it.
Disconnected.
It's nowhere near as risky, of course, but every time you've been first on line for an OS or OS X upgrade (particularly before Time Machine) you've put yourself in somewhat the same position as I did.
Well my Time Capsule is only connected when a Time Machine backup is in progress which certainly limits the length of the exposure. Besides that, I have not heard of a virus that is sophisticated enough to drill down through the various multi-linked files to get the to actual OS code. but it could happen although from the length of time it takes for Time Machine to pull up a version from the Time Capsule it certainly would not be a quick process.
