When Has Technology Done You Wrong?

[Glenn]

Identity theft is all the rage these days, and technology makes it increasingly easier to do, but still, you'd think it might be a a BIT of challenge to steal Paul Allen's ID. You'd THINK that... and you'd be wrong. Authorities in Pittsburgh just nabbed an AWOL soldier who, with one simple call to Citibank, managed to get a debit card linked to Allen's bank account. Not very sophisticated, but the guy got to a BILLIONAIRE.

Technology also provides distractions to the point of being very dangerous. We've all heard about the dangers of texting and driving, but how about texting and WALKING? Take Bonnie Miller of Michigan, a woman who walked off of a pier while texting. She was walking with her husband and 15- year- old son, but instead of enjoying 'family time', she was face- down on her phone... and then she was floating in a lake. Congratulations.

A guy in Tennessee broke into a house and stole, among other things, an 8- year- olds iPad. Thing is, the kid had a tracking app on his iPad, so he led police to the thief in about 40 minutes. Another round of congratulations and accolades!

I could go on and on, as their no shortage of stories of technology ruining a person's day or life, but today we wanted your story: WHEN HAS TECHNOLOGY DONE YOU WRONG?

[preach4bass]

GPS. Recalculating. Enough said.

[flippin and pitchin]

I'm sorry Glenn but technology has had some less than positive impacts. My pet peave, video games. Get kids outside and active. Texting and cell phones, in schools and especially when driving. Smart phones. Ever had to deal with complaints about " sexting " with kids who are 14, 15 and so on sending images of their genitalia to each other ? Identity Theft and Fraud costs people billions each year. The scams originate in Africa, are buffered in Europe and channeled through south America. Solveabilty rate ? ZERO. You are paying for the losses, trust me. Ever been in the middle of issuing an " E-ticket ", give to the offender the printed copy then have the system crash and loose it ? It's not all roses. Sorry, got on my soap box too long. It's my age I guess.

[Lund Explorer]

An employee of the VA breaks the rules when he takes his laptop out of the office, puts it in the trunk of his car, and then the car is stolen. 50+ years worth of veteran's personal data was on the hard drive prompting the VA to issue a letter to veterans about the potential lapse in security.

If you got one of those letters, did it occur to you that it didn't make any sense for the VA to purchase portable computers if they didn't want those computers to ever leave their offices?

This is just one of hundreds of case where your personal data is stored on someone else's computer and you have to hope (I've given up on the term "trust") that some lowlife doesn't figure out how to steal it. Just within the last week a credit card processor in NY had their computers hacked exposing who knows how many people.

Have you ever taken your computer into a store to be worked on? Ever had to have the hard drive replaced? Do you know what happened to the hard drive that got taken out? A man in South Carolina bought a box full of used computer parts that included a hard drive. When he started it up, he found that it included all of the personal data (including tax returns) for a couple from Chicago. The husband had taken the family computer into one of the big box stores to have the computer worked on a year before that. The gentleman from SC was nice enough to return it to the original owners!

All of this should make you feel a lot more secure. NOT!

[Lund Explorer]

Commercially available to anyone. Accounting software that allows the user to print company checks that will pass undetected through any bank's electronic readers using MICR toner in your home laserjet printer. The software will also print out approved W-2 Forms that no accountant would question while preparing a tax return.

How could that happen?

It only takes one mad former employee who received a paycheck and a W-2 from an employer. All of the checking account information needed is printed right there on the check including the routing and account numbers. The W-2 Form provides other information needed such as the employer's federal ID number.

[Lund Explorer]

Did it take a little longer for you to get your tax refund this year?

The IRS isn't to blame. They are simply trying to figure out a way to weed out all of the fake tax returns being filed in amongst the real ones.

Rapid Refunds? One Florida couple was caught after filing close to 100 bogus tax returns in the same year! Most of the returns were filed with the same large tax preparation firm's offices spread across the state. A review showed the couple had gamed the system to insure that they got the maximum refund on each return.

Simple tax return, W-2 wages only, two children for maximum EIC, walk out the door with check in hand, right to the check cashing store right down the road.

[grampa1114]

That stuff is all really scary but the Bozo on the cellphone, having a heated conversation, in traffic, coming right at me and my family......that's technology running wildly amock. JMHO

Grampa

[SirSnookalot]

Technology is created for big business to make more money, sure we have modern conveniences that we think are great but they are created not for us but for big companies to make lots of money. Robots do the job of many people, cost less to operate and don't take a lunch break, increases unemployment. Technology has either eliminated jobs by doing tasks better, faster, and cheaper than a humans can or having those tech jobs done offshore cheaper, either case technology puts people out of work. Once people get retrained and re employed,other kinds of jobs become obsolete, the cycle never ends.

[Siebert Outdoors]

I once lost using a Garmin GPS system. It had no clue where I was suppose to turn at. 4 right turns brings you back to the same spot. LOL

[Glenn]

Ummm.... does anyone have any funny stories? For example, I heard of a guy who's girlfriend took a bunch of naked pics of herself using his cell phone. Problem was, she didn't know he had an app that automatically posted all his pics on Facebook! DOH!

[Ratherbfishing]

You should have seen the "road" my GPS tried to take me down last week. It was more like a dirt walking path.

[grimlin]

Once a month I get somebody who's butt calls the house phone and I hear the entire conversation......Happens quite a bit...LOL

[SirSnookalot]

Once a month I get somebody who's butt calls the house phone and I hear the entire conversation......Happens quite a bit...LOL

I guess you never had a party line...........haha

[Olebiker]

The first time I took my father's old Bass Tracker on Lake Talquin I was idling away from the dock watching the depth finder. I was amazed at the quality of the images I was getting and was surprised at how deep the water was.

About that time, in 22 feet of water, I ran into a stump. It took me a few minutes to figure out that the depthfiinder was in "demo" mode. I was sure glad I was alone.

[Raider Nation Fisher]

I was trying to find a jobsite a few months ago. I entered the address Exactly how it was listed. My GPS unit took me to a empty field forty miles away from where I was supposed to be. After getting a stern lecture over the ordeal. It happened to my boss the next week. Same address and same field. The GPS software company dang sure got it wrong on that one.

[GrundleLove]

I got one, a fishing buddy of mine was trying to copy his dads navionics platinum chip onto his own SD card for his little dingy boat, well naturally he called me for assistance. I went over there and said how it MAY not be possible but ide have to take a look, needless to say he thinks he knows what he is doing so he tries to do it but apparently he didn't realize the card had a HID on it and was card specific, so it wouldnt work on his dads card any more and never even worked on his. 250 bucks later and him cursing me out for not getting there soon enough. (I would never promote anything illegal but apparently there arent many fisherman that are tech savvy because its pretttttyy easy to copy those cards and every where i read it says impossible....but i would never condone such things..)

[flippin and pitchin]

My son dropped his cell phone in the toilet. How did he overcome the soaking? He put it in a bag of rice. I like the thought of rice being technology. His efforts took the P out of the word PHONE.

[scrutch]

How about those little rf chips in your credit cards? Can you say scary? Perps can get your card data by just passing you by on the street!

[guitarkid]

at&t and samsung phones, enough said.

-gk

[Bassn Blvd]

Ok Glenn, true story.

I had just bought my first cell phone and barely knew how to turn it, much less operate all its functions. A co-worker friend and I had gone out to a bar for another co-worker's birthday. My friend told me to go outside and call his wife and tell her that he was in the process of negotiating a drug deal with a bad guy and would be home late. (Apparently, my friend's wife kept blowing up his phone and he didn't want her to know we were out partying while she was home pregnant) I made the phone call like my friend requested and provided his wife with one of my stellar fairy tale performances, which I felt extremely guilty for lying to her, but heck, she wasn't my wife.

Our night out on the town was flawless. We drank our behinds off and had a great time. At one point, my friend was giving a girl a piggy back ride while walking to the next bar.

We ended up closing the bars and got to our respective homes around 5am.

My co-worker friend calls and wakes me up about 9am to tell me how I totally F'd him up with his wife. Not yet knowing exactly what he was talking about, I told him it was his idea for me to call and lie to his wife. My friend explained to me it wasn't the lie that got him in trouble.

My friend said when he got home that his wife was up waiting for him. The wife asked him if he had a good time partying and who "so and so" was. My friend tried playing stupid and denied everything, telling his wife we were at work doing a drug deal/bust. The wife was like "really, who was the BIT** you gave a piggy back ride?" My friend kept to his guns and still denied knowing anything his wife was saying, but wondered how and the heck she could have known about the piggy back ride. The wife said "you and you're friends are so stupid" and went over to the home answering machine and pushed play.

My friend played the answering machine tape for me and I started laughing so hard that I puked (I was still drunk).

I guess when I hung up from lying to his wife; I put my cell phone in my back pocket without locking the keypad. My butt redialed his house number ALL night long. My friend's wife heard me in the bathroom taking a leak. She heard me trying to pick up girls. She heard me ordering drinks and heard us acting the fool. In fact, she got so tired of answering the phone every time I butt dialed their number that she finally let my calls go to the answering machine.

The worst part- remember the girl my friend gave the piggy back ride to? HAHA, you could hear him clear as day on the answering machine bragging to me what nice jugs she had, how good she smelled and how she was all over him.

That incident happened many years ago and thankfully my friend and his wife are still married, no thanks to me of course or telephone technology.

[tnbassfisher]

Nearly everything that I have for school is done online. A lot of homework, turning in papers, etc. is online. It can be absolutely miserable. If the internet goes down for a few hours, you're kind of out of luck.