Home Depot’s massive credit card breach (over 50 million accounts impacted) offers an opportunity to teach your students about how they can protect their own identities as the hackers get more sophisticated.  First, what happened at Home Depot?

From NY Times Bits Blog:

Home Depot confirmed on Monday that hackers had broken into its in-store payments systems, in what could be the largest known breach of a retail company’s computer network.

The retailer said the exact number of customers affected was still not clear. But a person briefed on the investigation said the total number of credit card numbers stolen at Home Depot could top 60 million. By comparison, the breach last year at Target, the largest known attack to date, affected 40 million cardholders.

So, how can students protect themselves as they enter the world of financial products, whether it be with a checking accounts, credit cards and/or debit card.  How about asking students to develop a one minute PSA (Public Service Announcement) to educate their peers about how they can protect themselves.  To get them started in the right direction, here are three articles that they can reference:

• NIne ways to protect against credit card fraud (Consumer Reports)
• Worried about the Home Depot breach?  10 Steps to Protect Yourself From Future Attacks (Forbes)
• Young adults at biggest risk of credit card fraud (KOMU.com)

About the Author

Tim Ranzetta

Tim's saving habits started at seven when a neighbor with a broken hip gave him a dog walking job. Her recovery, which took almost a year, resulted in Tim getting to know the bank tellers quite well (and accumulating a savings account balance of over $300!). His recent entrepreneurial adventures have included driving a shredding truck, analyzing executive compensation packages for Fortune 500 companies and helping families make better college financing decisions. After volunteering in 2010 to create and teach a personal finance program at Eastside College Prep in East Palo Alto, Tim saw firsthand the impact of an engaging and activity-based curriculum, which inspired him to start a new non-profit, Next Gen Personal Finance.