LifeLock

Arguably the industry leader in identity theft services, Lifelock is trying to grow its brand recognition even further. In June of this year, the company partnered with Boston based word of mouth marketing company, Bzzagent, to help spread the word about identity theft prevention and introduce more people to the benefits of using this service. This is just the latest in the company’s ongoing quest to stay in the public eye.

Thousands of “agents,” who are ordinary people that registered for the Bzzagent website at a certain point in time, will receive a free one-year Lifelock membership as well as a coupon code for a six-month membership that they can share with a friend. In exchange, they are tasked with telling friends, family members and even casual acquaintances what they think of Lifelock and reporting back to Bzzagent about how people respond. Agents aren’t paid for their opinions, but they do get rewarded with MyPoints for completing certain tasks. They are expected to be unbiased, not just to act like paid promoters who only mention the positive aspects of a product – well, if they want to keep their jobs as promoters anyway.

This program could go a long way in helping to educate the public about identity theft, and about protection plans. Even with all the cases in the news, it’s likely some people haven’t looked into identity theft protection at all, and some may not even know that these services exist. The more awareness there is, the better it is for everyone – well, perhaps except for the identity thieves of course.

Even if you’re not a Bzzagent, you can help to spread the word about identity theft and the things you can do to make sure it doesn’t happen to you. Plus, you can get a great discount on the Lifelock service just by signing up through our website. Lifelock is one of the most comprehensive identity theft protection services out there, and new services are being added to the package all the time. This year they launched LifeLock Command Center as their flagship service. Be sure to check back for the latest updates and reviews so that you can generate some buzz of your own.

Editors Note: LifeLock Ultimate Plus is the new flagship service as of September 2014.

The popular identity theft protection service, LifeLock, seems to be everywhere these days. Now, the LifeLock team is working with the FBI Law Enforcement Executive Development Association to create summits on identity theft to benefit police officers.

These summits, which will take place over the summer, will cover the following topics:
*Methods used for investigation
*New and emerging methods of identity theft
*Current identity theft trends

The first round of these free summits started in October of 2008. Since then, they’ve been held in 21 different cities in the United States. Over 700 law enforcement agencies and over 2,200 officers have attended them.

The importance of these free training is threefold. First, officers learn to recognize identity theft when it occurs. Second, they learn new techniques for preventing the crime and catching the perpetrators. Finally, they learn how to support victims in an effective way.

It could be thanks to this training that Albert Gonzalez was finally convicted and tried for stealing 40 million card numbers from popular retail and restaurant chains. Gonzalez was ultimately sentenced to spend 20 years in jail for his crimes.

This brings up a good point, that if you are a victim of identity theft, or your purse, wallet or laptop computer gets stolen, it’s important to contact the police in the jurisdiction where the crime occurred. If you don’t do that and simply cancel your license and credit cards and move on instead, law enforcement will have no record of the crime occurring. With the crime logged, as well as statements from you and any witnesses, it’s more likely that the identity thief – or traditional thief – will be caught.

Most thieves don’t operate just one time and then give up on their line of work. Your thief could be linked to several other crimes, and you reporting her could be just what law enforcement needs in order to finally prosecute. If you have an identity theft protection service and your plan alerts you to potential fraud, the company may contact law enforcement for you. It’s up to you to read the terms of your policy to see if that is the case.

LifeLock certainly is one such company.

Here’s more proof that identity theft is still a big topic in the news. LifeLock recently made its second appearance in prime time TV, on an episode of the Celebrity Apprentice. Its first appearance occurred last year on the same show. On this year’s episode, the contestants were tasked with promoting a bundled product that includes both a year of LifeLock service and Norton 360, a computer security product.

Janice Chaffin of Norton told CNN Money, “Working with a reality show … is a great way to educate consumers. Todd Davis, the CEO of LifeLock added, “This episode is the perfect outlet to demonstrate to viewers how to protect their good name.” It’s hoped that viewers were able to pick up some tips to help protect themselves in the future.

The reason it’s so important is that there are still 10 million victims of identity theft each year in this country – even though people are better educated than in the past. Part of the reason is because thieves are getting more sophisticated, but part of it is that a lot of individuals, and we’re talking 100’s of thousands, are still pretty careless with their personal information.

While they may not write all of their sensitive details on a card and hand them directly to a thief, they aren’t shredding sensitive mail, keeping watch on their laptops or locking them when they’re not using them or being careful what websites they visit. If they were, things would not be so easy for identity thieves, and they may have to find themselves legitimate employment.

Even if you know all of the tips and tricks you can use to protect your information, there may be one thing you haven’t thought about before or maybe many and there are certainly things you can’t do that LifeLock identity theft protection can. While LifeLock is consistently rated as one of the best available, there are literally dozens more, with varying degrees of protection for their clients. We only include the best identity protection options at Identity Theft Labs so you can rest assured regardless of who you choose.

You can find out more about LifeLock and Norton software on their respective websites. You can purchase the product featured on the show at your local Best Buy electronics store. If you happened to miss the episode, you can check it out online at nbc.com. If it’s not available yet, it should be in the next few days. There is no charge to view it, but your machine will have to be compatible with a video and sound player.

Keep in mind that the Norton bundle is LifeLock’s Basic Service. If you want better protection you can read our review on LifeLock Ultimate Plus. It is simply the best protection on the market right now.

The Federal Trade Commission announced the other day that a settlement has been reached with LifeLock to the tune of $12 million. Since the breaking of this news, and partially due to a press release issued by LifeLock referencing Identity Theft Lab’s rating of them as the “Best Overall” identity protection, we have been asked on a few occasions most notably by Zoran Basich in his Wall Street Journal Venture Blog whether our “best overall” rating will remain. The short answer is yes, for now, but first lets take a deeper look at this settlement and the, ahem, errors made by LifeLock before we give you the reason for our decision.

According to a press release issued by the FTC, LifeLock agreed to pay $11 million to the FTC and $1 million to a group of 35 state attorneys generals to settle charges that they used false claims to promote their identity theft protection services between April 1, 2005 and March 31, 2009 and that LifeLock failed, at least at some point within this timeframe, to adequately safeguard their clients personal information as they had stated they would do.

The FTC took exception to LifeLock CEO Todd Davis advertising his Social Security number everywhere and referenced its widely advertised use on the side of a truck. This combined with some other statements and advertisements may have given consumers a false sense of security in regards to how well their identity was protected and for some consumers may have given the impression that LifeLock was protecting them from all or other types of identity theft when they were predominantly just protecting them from financial identity theft with a strong emphasis on new account fraud.

The press release stated “And even for types of identity theft for which fraud alerts are most effective, they do not provide absolute protection. They alert creditors opening new accounts to take reasonable measures to verify that the individual applying for credit actually is who he or she claims to be, but in some instances, identity thieves can thwart even reasonable precautions.”

Anyone who has followed this blog will know that there is no such thing as full-proof identity theft protection and that fraud alerts while effective should not be your only means of protection. It should also be noted that LifeLock changed its marketing practices by April of 2009, launched a new enhanced service by October 2009 and then, this past January, added a whole new level of protection called LifeLock Command Center that actually does help protect Americans from other types of identity theft such as criminal.

“As the crimes of identity theft and identity fraud continue to evolve, we have positioned our business to grow at a more rapid pace in attempt to stay in front of the crime,” said LifeLock Chairman and CEO Todd Davis. “With our next generation LifeLock Identity Alert(TM) system and our advanced LifeLock Command Center(TM) protection suite, we are using technologies that allow us to search broader, deeper and for more data than ever before.”

Even when considering LifeLock’s old service, what the FTC failed to see or at least point out is that Americans are mostly concerned about financial identity theft and that by discovering an identity theft situation of any kind you are better protected from other types as well because you now know that some thief has your personal information. This causes your guard to go up, at least it should, and you will become more vigilant in protecting your identity even for something totally unrelated such as a hospital visit. For example, you may ask your doctor to confirm that the last time you were looked after actually was the last time YOU were looked after.

The FTC press release also claimed that “LifeLock’s data was not encrypted, and sensitive consumer information was not shared only on a “need to know” basis. In fact, the agency charged, the company’s data system was vulnerable and could have been exploited by those seeking access to customer information. ” It also states “the settlements require LifeLock to establish a comprehensive data security program and obtain biennial independent third-party assessments of that program for twenty years.”

It is important to note that there was no external breach but still this shocked us. How can an identity theft protection company not be taking the highest of security measures when the lack of such measures can result in a devastating setback for the company. We know LifeLock has always taken the security of its clients seriously, they have earned and maintained an ISO 27001 Security Certification since January 2007, but the lack of encryption is unacceptable and should not have happened. There is no excuse for not employing the strictest security measures possible. We realize that the FTC claim is from the past and not relating to LifeLock’s current security measures but maybe this is why they hired a new Chief Technology Officer a few months back and added another Senior Executive to its technology team recently.

Many people will claim that the independent third-party assessments are over regulation but we do not see this as a bad thing. Even LifeLock welcomed the settlement and increased industry regulation.

“LifeLock is pleased with this agreement, which, for the very first time, works to set advertising guidelines for the entire industry. We welcome federal and state efforts to regulate our industry, because doing so helps to protect consumers from the risks of identity theft,” said LifeLock Chairman and CEO Todd Davis.

At least now, clients of LifeLock will know their personal information is protected to the highest levels of security. Financial Institutions, Credit Bureaus and Identity Theft Protection Companies should be held to a higher standard of security and independent third-party assessments for all of them would certainly ensure they are using best of breed technologies, implementing the strictest policies and procedures and enforcing the highest security measures possible. Don’t consumers deserve this?

So the question remains, does LifeLock still have the “best overall” identity protection. The answer is yes. As you probably picked up on, the FTC settlement was due to past behavior relating to their old outdated service and old marketing practices. This is not to condone what happened but LifeLock is far from the first company to take their advertising over the top. And quite frankly, we will leave the judgement of what constitutes acceptable marketing to the FTC, that is their role. Ours is to evaluate the service itself and for now, we still see LifeLock as the best overall identity theft protection service, and don’t see the point in punishing them for their past mistakes, especially since the FTC just did this.

But there is a caveat to this. We never intended to recommend LifeLock to everyone, our goal has always been to find the best of breed identity theft services and review and compare them in such a way that it allows consumers to see the points of difference between these services so that they can choose the right service for them.

We consider all the companies in our identity theft protection comparison chart (see our homepage) to be excellent and perhaps in the near future we will revert to presenting them all as best of breed and drop the “best overall” and other taglines or notes we have on our site. In the meantime, however brief, we have decided to let it stay because right now many people are shying away from LifeLock and given their current offering we don’t believe that is the right thing to do.

Here is our review of LifeLock basic.

To help customers find a complete credit protection service for their personal finances, Life Quotes, Inc., an online service provider of comprehensive insurance options, have recently entered into a partnership with LifeLock Inc., the industry leader in proactive identity theft protection, that will provide Life Quotes users their service at a 10% discount. This is the same LifeLock discount provided here.

“Helping protect our members’ personally identifiable information is LifeLock’s primary focus,” said Steve McGrady, LifeLock Vice President of Partner Sales. “In order to help safeguard more consumers from the threats of identity theft, it is especially important for us to continue working with companies like Life Quotes, who help consumers take charge of their finances and protect what’s most valuable to them.”

In the same way that Identity Theft Labs provides a trusted and convenient way for consumers to review and compare identity theft protection services so they can find the plan that is best for their families, Life Quotes provides an online resource for consumers looking to find the right insurance company. In addition to life insuance, Life Quotes also provides quotes for auto, health and business insurance, helping busy consumers and business owners save time and money.

“Life Quotes customers tend to be the kind of consumers that consciously stay ahead of the curve when it comes to their personal and business finances,” said Mike Zuccato, Director of Online Marketing. “Through this partnership with LifeLock, we hope to provide our users with a necessary tool for helping to protect against identity theft. Just as life insurance and other forms of insurance are important protection measures, an identity theft service is crucial to keeping a stronger hold on finances.”

In a joint press release it was noted that “Both LifeLock and Life Quotes aim to help individuals with families to support. Especially with the current state of the economy, the need for families to protect their personal finances is greater than ever before. The partnership between LifeLock and Life Quotes provides Life Quotes users with an opportunity to receive LifeLock’s extensive identity theft protection service at a discounted rate. “

As the threat of identity theft continues to increase and consumer awareness grows we expect to see more of these partnerships between identity protection companies and businesses who see how adding credit protection as a service for their customers or staff adds value to their offer or company.