Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley has announced that "her office is leading a multi-state civil investigation into the recently disclosed security breach at TJX Companies. The Consumer Protection Division of the Attorney General's Office is investigating the breach, which was disclosed last month by the Framingham-based company, and particularly what security measures the company took to protect consumer information."

The Federal Trade Commission has issued its annual report, “Consumer Fraud and Identity Theft Complaint Data,” (PDF) reporting on complaints consumers have filed with the agency. For the seventh year in a row, identity theft tops the list, accounting for 36 percent of the 674,354 complaints received between January 1 and December 31, 2006. Other categories near the top of the complaint list include shop-at-home/catalog sales; prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries; Internet services and computer complaints; and Internet auction fraud.

Visa International and SK Telecom have announced plans to launch "what they expect to be the world's first contactless payment application on a universal SIM card which is personalized over-the-air."

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