According to Javelin Strategy & Research … 1 in 8 onliners post their pet’s name to social media sites, even though its a fairly common challenge question used to confirm identities.
More generally, Javelin warns that consumers’ social media and mobile behaviors may be putting them at greater risk.
in 2011, identity fraud increased by 13 percent … more than 11.6 million adults became a victim of identity fraud in the United States,
Javelin reports that “consumers are still sharing a significant amount of personal information frequently used to authenticate a consumer’s identity.”
Specifically,
- 68 percent of people with public social media profiles shared their birthday information (with 45 percent sharing month, date and year);
- 63 percent shared their high school name;
- 18 percent shared their phone number;
- 12 percent shared their pet’s name
All are prime examples of personal information a company would use to verify you
The Homa Files 