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Do not publish anything confidential on social media or similar and do not give out such information to a caller unless you are sure who it is.

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