Okay, so I'm in the local Staples last night, helping my sister to buy a new monitor for her desktop. In the center of the computer department there is display station with all the new laptop and notebook models, all powered-up and connected to the internet, for prospective buyers to test out. I'm checking one out myself, when....
The Stupidest Woman in the World Walks In.
She, too, is browsing the laptops (hmm, perhaps I should think about a different term there) and trying a few out. She's young, perhaps no older than 25. She's rather pretty, but she has this vacant look upon her face reminiscent of cattle just before they get the stun gun to the back of the neck, the de rigeur cell phone glued to her ear. If I had to describe her looks and demeanor in precise detail, I would refer to her as the Prototype for the Sperm-Burping Barbie doll. She's chatting on her cell with another possibly-airheaded gum-snapping putana, and then, it happens...
Whatever the two were busily mewling about concerned Facebook. It was such an urgent matter that my pretty-little-cellphone-dingbat needed to sign on to Facebook this very goddamned second. It was a sense of urgency like I have only ever seen in firefighters and women in labor. So, she's about three feet away from me when the first indication of mental disease manifests: she actually has to ask Boyfriend --- He's an obvious Metrosexual with one of those new-fangled swoopy-do haircuts. We'll describe him as "Gelded-Hair-Gel Ken", and has been hovering at a safe distance of 30 feet or so, admiring the latest Bluetooth headsets --- what her own password is. This conversation takes place across two or three isles of merchandise, with approximately a dozen people within earshot. My shock at this seemingly-stupid-and-slightly-dangerous conversation could perhaps only be surpassed my surprise that they hadn't simply texted each other, like all the hip youngin's do these days.
Anywhoo, I now know this young lady's Fcaebook signon, and her password. And I wasn't even looking for them.
Whatever was such a glaring emergency that she needed someone to shout out her Facebook password in a crowded store must have been severely disappointing when she had finally gotten to it. Perhaps it was one of those "you had to be there..." sort of things that struck The Other End of That Phone Conversation as funny or important, but which didn't quite tickle her fancy, because she quickly lost interest in it. Perhaps that was just an indication of her natural attention span, maybe there were no Prada 4" stilletto heels involved, but who knows? In short order she tired of Facebook, she tired of her conversation , and decided that this was now a good time to check her bank balance...On a computer available to the general public...
Yes, the bank card came out. She needed to have it handy because she apparently doesn't know her account number, either. But there she was; typing those numbers into the computer-that-anyone-can-use-with-minimal-security-on-it, the card left flush on the countertop for easy viewing. Boyfriend returns, the two quickly discuss getting a Starbucks, and they begin to walk away...
But I stop them. And I show the young lady that whatever she's just typed into that Open-to-the-public laptop can be easily retrieved by someone with enough sense to avoid sticking his genitalia into a food processor. Does she thank me? Does she say "Oh, crap! That never occurred to me before!" No.
Instead, I'm admonished to mind my own fuckin' business. How dare I listen in on her conversations, and how dare I read over her shoulder...in a public place...where's she's shouting for passwords across several isles in a store...and placing her personal financial information on countertops and computers where it can easily be snatched by those with bad intent.
I hope she's up to her ass in credit card debt that she didn't incur by the end of the week. I seriously hope her reputation (if she has one beyond "has no gag reflex") is ruined within a month. I seriously hope her career (is "nail technician" even a career?) is destroyed because she's a moron. Because that is exactly what happens to people who don't defend themselves against identity theft.
People complain loudly about there being no privacy anymore, and then they won't even take simple steps, or advice, on how to protect what's left...Fuck 'em all, I say.
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