How Much Does Your Boss Know?

Sept. 12, 2006 — -- It's funny that in today's high-tech world, with everyone afraid of losing their identities, something as personal as a phone call can be given to a stranger.

Yes, a phone call.

Most telephone companies -- wireless and land lines alike -- will give a person access to your records, with as little as the last four digits of your Social Security number needed for identification purposes.

Moreover, guess what? Your employer already has that information. So does your husband or wife. So any of those people could theoretically access your phone records whenever they wanted.

Can you imagine what someone could learn from that? Anyone could see whether you had made a phone call to inquire about a new job or a specialized doctor, or, even worse, to cheat on your spouse.

Is that the kind of information you want your employer to have?

The technique of gathering this information is a form of "pretexting" -- an investigative technique in which someone poses as another person to gain private information -- and it can occur at the highest levels of American business.

A pretexting scandal swirled around Hewlett-Packard recently after the company's board of directors hired an investigative firm to research board members.

One board member quit in protest, and the U.S. Attorney's Office is now probing whether the search was legal.

The good news is that this type of information gathering can be prevented with a low-tech solution, and you can take care of it today.

As soon as you stop reading this, pick up the phone, call your phone company and your wireless provider, and tell the representative you would like to have a "password" put on your account, to restrict access.

Once you do this, the next time you call for billing information the representative will see your account is "password blocked" and ask you for the password before they give out any information.

Most credit-card companies will also provide this extra level of security for you, and it is free.