1. Welcome to SportsJournalists.com, a friendly forum for discussing all things sports and journalism.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register for a free account to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Access to private conversations with other members.
    • Fewer ads.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Shocking: "Lifelock" founder a victim of ID theft

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by Write-brained, May 25, 2008.

  1. Anyone see these commercials - where the founder boasts about the company's ID theft protections by broadcasting his own Social Security number - and not see this coming?

    Oh, and it turns out his $1 million guarantee is basically a scam. Surprise!

    Good articles in Salon and The New York Times.

    Salon:

    Todd Davis, the CEO of LifeLock, one of a slate of venture capital-backed start-ups that aim to protect you against identity theft, is fond of sharing.

    For two years, LifeLock has run ads on TV, radio, newspapers, and billboards that broadcast Davis's most intimate details.

    No, not the length of his penis -- gargantuan! -- but something even more private, his Social Security Number: 457-55-5462.

    This was a kind of advertising bravado. LifeLock claims to safeguard your I.D. by setting up a series of alerts to let you know when, among other things, someone applies for credit or a change of address with your info, or when your data appears on credit-card trading sites.

    The company acknowledges that you can do much of this stuff for yourself, for free -- but for $10 a month, LifeLock takes care of the whole process for you. It also backs the service with a guarantee. If your I.D. is stolen, the company says it will pay to set things right:

    If you need lawyers, we're going to hire the best we can find. If you need investigators, accountants, case managers, whatever, they're yours. If you lose money as a result of the theft, we're going to give it back to you.

    We will do whatever it takes to help you recover your good name and we will spend up to $1,000,000 to do it.

    Sounds good, yeah? Thing is, LifeLock faces lawsuits from customers in Maryland, West Virginia, and New Jersey who claim that the company's advertisements are false.

    Another lawsuit filed in Arizona charges that the company's guarantee is bogus. To top it off, Experian, the credit-reporting agency, is suing LifeLock for deceptive practices, pointing out that the firm doesn't offer people any more than they can get for free from Experian itself.

    As the primary exhibit of LifeLock's possible bogosity, the plaintiffs point to this inconvenient truth: After putting his SSN on the air, CEO Davis was himself defrauded. A man in Texas used Davis's numbers to obtain a $500 payday loan.

    Davis acknowledges this irony. But on the "Today" show this morning -- see video below -- he argued that the attack only proves that his system works. Huh?

    Yeah, the logic's tough to follow, but basically Davis's saying that if he hadn't been using LifeLock, he'd have been scammed for a lot more. After all, his I.D. is everywhere.

    Well, but Matt Lauer countered, it seems that Davis has been scammed for more

    "We went to our database and it appears that dozens of people are using your Social Security number -- including a guy named Joe Blow in Carson City, a man on 123 Fake St., and Jabba T. Hutt," Lauer pointed out.
     
  2. imjustagirl

    imjustagirl Active Member

    That's awesome. Those commercials annoyed the piss out of me.
     
  3. Norman Stansfield

    Norman Stansfield Active Member

    I just got a $10,000 loan using his SS with the name Hugh Jardon.

    Awesome!
     
  4. ondeadline

    ondeadline Well-Known Member

    It's not every story that you get to see the word "bogosity."
     
  5. Unfortunately.
     
  6. I am using that in a headline quick, fast and in a hurry.
     
  7. Mystery_Meat

    Mystery_Meat Guest

    They're sposoring a NASCAR show on ABC right now. It's like half show, half infomercial. Still giving out the SSN. Kasey Kahne deserves to have his identity stolen for being associated with this bull shit.
     
  8. zebracoy

    zebracoy Guest

    Jabba T. Hutt. Brilliant.
     
  9. Tom Petty

    Tom Petty Guest

    i only wish i would have thought of that, too.
     
  10. Pencil Dick

    Pencil Dick Member

    What, Heywood Jablome and Heywood Jablome Jr. didn't get involved in this scam? (Both for years were actually listed in the Nashville telephone directory.)
     
Draft saved Draft deleted

Share This Page