Most Americans have no emergency savings, a new survey shows. The findings are consistent with a host of other surveys and government data that chronicle Americans' abysmal savings rate and, more important, our lack of preparedness for life's unexpected events.

Released Monday at a press conference designed to call attention to "America Saves Week," the survey by the Consumer Federation of America and other consumer agencies indicates that only 40 percent of adult Americans maintain separate emergency savings accounts. And about one-third of those savers have set aside less than $2,000 for that inevitable rainy day.

Even $2,000 is considerably less than the 3- to 6-months of living expenses that most personal finance advocates recommend as an emergency kitty. Coincidentally, it is exactly the amount Hurricane Katrina victims received in "expedited assistance" aid from the federal government in the days after the storm. Thousands of victims didn't get the benefits because of computer glitches and other technicalities, and many of them were left with nearly no means of support after their homes and jobs were washed out by the storm. The Katrina aftermath shined a harsh light on the financial preparedness of many American consumers.

The study mimics research released soon after Hurricane Katrina by the financial services firm HSBC, which found that four in 10 Americans don't even have enough savings in the bank to live for one month.

The new survey shows that poorer Americans and minorities are even less likely to have emergency savings. About 60 percent of those with incomes over $75,000 said they had emergency savings, but only one-quarter of those earning less than $25,000 did.

"There are many, many factors as to why situation exists, including lack of income, pressure to spend, the easy availability of credit, and pessimism about being able to save," said Stephen Brobeck, executive director of the consumer federation. "But the large majority of low- and moderate-income households can afford to save. And it's important to explain to households how they can save."

Brobeck recommended a host of savings tips for consumers, including: directing employers to automatically set aside a small amount into savings accounts for emergencies, using part of their tax refund to begin a savings account or setting aside loose change.

"Our emphasis is on starting small, but starting," he said.

Financial fitness rarely discussed
Michael Benjamin, executive director of Family, Career and Community Leaders of America, said that in light of Americans' negative savings rate -- the Commerce Department said recently that Americans now spend more than they earn, and are saving less than at any time since the Great Depression -- it's important to begin a national dialogue on savings accounts.

"Financial fitness is one of the last things discussed in the family," Benjamin said.

George Barany, director of financial education for the consumer federation, said consumers should set aside a small amount for savings even if they find themselves deep in debt -- a concept sometimes called "pay yourself first."

"There is a psychological benefit in seeing an account grow," he said. "When people start saving regularly, we find after four to six months there is a psychological lift and they do get more enthusiastic about savings."

Like 'Telling somebody who is short to get taller'
But several personal finance experts said the savings suggestions rang a bit hollow.

"Families aren't saving because they don't have any money," said Elizabeth Warren, author of "All Your Worth." Telling people who are struggling paycheck-to-paycheck to save money is like "telling somebody who is short to get taller," she said.

Ideally, Warren said, consumers should spend no more than 50 percent of their income on basics such as housing and health care. A full 20 percent should be saved for emergencies and retirement, she said. But few families can afford that kind of split.

"This isn't about spending sprees at the mall," she said."The problem is the size of the mortgage, the cost of health insurance, the cost of child care. Any solution has to be aimed at the big expenses, not trying to nibble at the edges. ... The real differences come not by starting at the savings end but at the spending end."

Robert Manning, author of "Credit Card Nation," said that the evolution of easy credit in the form of credit cards during the past several decades has radically changed consumers' ideas about what constitutes a financial problem.

"It used to be when you had overspent at the end of the month," he said. "Now the perception is they have a problem when the bank won't lend them any more money."

'Pay yourself first' doesn't work
Manning said he doesn't think consumers would be moved to set aside $10 to $20 a week unless they saw such a plan as the start of something much bigger.

"Pay yourself first isn't a worthwhile strategy if that's the end of your strategy," he said. "People need to see a link (how saving) $10 week is really going to change (their) lives."

Manning also wasn't convinced in the practicality of the savings advice.

He said some low-income earners would be better off pre-paying their mortgages than setting aside money in a low-interest savings account, for example.

"There are lots of ways to save," he said.

Better answer: A line of credit
Liz Pulliam Weston, an MSN personal finance columnist and author of several books, including "Deal with Your Debt," also questioned the focus on shifting money into a bank savings account. Saving for retirement and paying down credit card debt are higher priorities then depositing funds into a traditional bank account, she said.

Weston advocates alternative preparation for dealing with emergency expenses -- consumers without substantial savings can apply for a line of credit with their bank, for instance. Getting a line of credit before a crisis hits enables consumers to shop for low interest rates and lock them in, as opposed to looking for emergency loans after a crisis, when options are sure to be limited, she said. Paying down credit card balances also frees up available credit for dealing with emergencies, she said.

She didn't dispute the wisdom of gathering up some limited sum -- such as one week's salary -- to keep on hand. But she said consumers should first "really start attacking their credit card debt ... and not divide their loyalties" by splitting off money to build a low-interest savings account balance.

There is universal agreement, however, that Americans' poor savings rate is a sign of trouble. Some financial experts call the data misleading, saying that money socked away in 401K retirement plans or increased equity acquired through rising home values aren't reflected. But the data still indicate that Americans are spending more than they make, a formula which obviously can't last.

"Too many families are living in a state where if the transmission falls out of the car it will send the family budget into chaos. Psychologically it's a miserable place to be," Warren said. "The negative savings rate should be a wake-up call."

Eighty-nine-year-old Esther Shapiro once ran Detroit's office of consumer protection. She's been out of politics for a while, but she still fights almost every day for what she says is a fundamental consumer right -- the right to see price tags on cereal, bread, spaghetti sauce and everything else in grocery stores.

It's a battle she might be losing. Price tags once were mandatory for most grocery stores. Now just few states require them, and they seem destined to go the way of drive-in movie theaters and ice cream fountains.

Knowing how much something costs is pretty basic to shopping, and to fairness. Clear price tag labels -- whether on a jar of spaghetti sauce at a grocery store or on an automobile at a car dealership -- are essential to comparison shopping. And yet, price tags have all but disappeared, Shapiro says. That's why she goes on her weekly shopping trips and makes her stand.

Shapiro does her shopping in Michigan, one of the last states to require price tags on every item in grocery stores, and still makes a lot of "bonus" money doing it. She often finds price tag mistakes on bread, milk, cereal and everything else in grocery stores. In Michigan, state law grants consumers a "bonus" of 10 times the difference every time they spot a price tag error, up to $5. So stores get nervous when Shapiro arrives.

"When I feel like enhancing my income there's always one store I shop at," she says. "They just look at me and pull out the money."

The extra cash is nice, but Shapiro says this isn't really about getting her bonus money. Consumers need price tags to make sure they're not getting cheated at the checkout, Shapiro says.

"It's the nibbling away of those dimes and dollars over a period of time," she says. "It's not pennies. It adds up to a lot of dollars over the years."

Price tag laws ignored
Michigan's item pricing law has been under attack from retailers for years, as is a similar law in Massachusetts. Scattered counties in New York state also require price tags, but beyond that, most states now allow generic shelf price labels.

Retailers much prefer the shelf tags. The practice of pricing and repricing items is labor intensive – and so expensive that some retailers ignore it altogether. Last year, Walmart agreed to pay a $1.5 million settlement after Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox alleged the company didn't have price tags on 80 percent of its items in some stores. Home Depot settled a class-action item pricing lawsuit in Massachusetts by paying $3.8 million in 2002. The Boston Globe reported last year that B.J.'s Wholesale Club had been fined for missing price tags every single time an inspector walked into a store in the preceding three years.

Esther Shapiro

Some retail stores consider such fines merely the cost of doing business, says Edgar Dworsky of ConsumerWorld.org. He was an assistant attorney general in Massachusetts during the 1990s and wrote that state's item pricing law. Rather than comply with price tag laws, retailers have pressured state legislatures to drop them, he said.

Such efforts have successfully chipped away at the item pricing laws in Michigan and Massachusetts. There is a wide swath of exemptions for grocery stores -- items on end-of-aisle displays and frozen foods don't need price tags, for example. In Massachusetts, stores can exempt entire classes of items, such as gum or soda.

Bills introduced in the last legislative session in Massachusetts would allow stores to switch to shelf labels, and exempt stores from class-action consumer lawsuits. Other laws allow stores to drop price tags if they install self-service scanning machines.

That might seem like a reasonable alternative to pesky price tags, but those devices don't work as well as advertised, Dworsky says, largely because many stores fail to keep them operating. A July 2004 survey conducted by Consumer World found that three out of four price scanners failed to comply with Massachusetts regulations. When the state Division of Standards did a similar study in 2005, 10 percent of the machines didn't work at all.

"The truth is, every time you lower the standards for these stores, they perform even lower than those new standards," Dworsky says.

Generally, retailers say the cost of putting price tags on items is prohibitive and hurts consumers through higher prices. A study by economics professors from the University of Minnesota, Cornell and other schools in 2004 puts the cost at 25 cents per item. That's hardly worth the savings of catching the occasional overcharge from mispriced items, the argument goes.

Beyond catching errors
But price accuracy is only one benefit of price tags, Dworsky says. Without price tags, consumers who don't have photographic memories simply can't comparison shop as they wander around a store. Is the jar of spaghetti sauce near the checkout cheaper than the one they already picked up in aisle seven? Who would know? Without price tags, what consumer is smart enough to add up the price of the items in their cart to see if they've got enough money? Price tags also lead to price awareness after consumers bring their groceries home. That box of cereal in the cupboard says it's $3.29, so why is it now $3.49?

But even more basic than that, Shapiro says, is the problem posed by shelf label confusion.

"Items move around," she says. And sometimes, it's hard to know what price goes with what item. Item abbreviations on shelf labels are often written in tiny print, with cryptic abbreviations that are confusing.

"And stores work hard to divert you from thinking about what you are buying, by playing music, distracting you," Shapiro says. "If you aren't given the price … it's very hard to concentrate on getting your money's worth."

Confusion, of course, is good for stores and bad for consumers. A confused customer, particularly one who's in the dark about the cost of an item, will always spend more in a store. Why then, do so few people seem to get upset about the end of the price tag?

"There is a generational gap there," Shapiro says. "Senior citizens were brought up to watch these pennies," but today's generation is not nearly so price-focused, she says.

Could technology save the day?
The death sentence for the price tag will really arrive the day that Universal Price Code bar codes became, well, universal. They eliminate the retailer's need to label items with prices. Items are labeled, of course, but only in a language a computer understands. And there lies, perhaps, a bit of hope for both Shapiro and the younger generation.

Stores are already beginning to implement tiny radio-broadcasting computer chips called RFID for inventory control. Eventually, these will replace UPC symbols as a means for telling store cash registers how much to charge. If RFID is implemented correctly, consumers will have ready access to scanners -- perhaps even on their key chains -- with pricing information. Once the data is received, a small computer could make a whole host of additional information available to consumers. That could ease price comparisons, total price calculations and even coupon management.

Or RFID could be implemented without consumer input and make item pricing even more confusing for consumers. Shapiro is worried about price tags disappearing, not with a bang, but with a register-scanner beep.

"The basic right of consumers (is) to know what things cost," says Shapiro, vowing to continue her price-tag quest. "How do you make your choices if you aren't given that information?"

As the Righteous Brothers might say, you've lost that loving feeling -- for online dating.

Would-be Valentines are now apparently looking for love in other places. Only 10 percent of Net users questioned in a recent survey said they had recently browsed online personals, compared to 20 percent in 2003. And the decline seems to be quickening. Last year, the figure was 16 percent.

It seems that what was once an alternative to the tired meat-market bar scene has seemingly become a tired virtual meat market.

"The sites you lurk on, it's like going to a bar. After a while it gets old," says Joelle Gropper Kaufman, vice president of online dating site Engage.com. "These are just massive online bars."

Like bars, the sites are still making good money -- some $650 million in 2006, according to survey author Nate Elliot of JupterResearch. That figure is up slightly from 2005, but the increase is attributable to price hikes rather than new customers, he said.

"Despite continued revenue growth, the U.S. online dating market is facing a period of considerable uncertainty over its ability to attract a significant number of new users to the category," Elliot wrote in his report.

Was an e-commerce darling
Just four short years ago, online dating seemed to be the Internet's new killer app, ready to take its place along with e-mail, eBay and Web browsing. It was one of the few dependably profitable electronic commerce categories. It had remarkably low overhead -- consumers voluntarily provided all the content (pictures), and all the merchandise (themselves). The sites just siphoned off a monthly fee. And buyers had the strongest motivation of all: Mother Nature.

So what's gone wrong? Market leaders eHarmony, Match.com and Yahoo Personals have spent serious marketing dollars trying to attract would-be lovebirds. And the number of single online users looking for love certainly hasn't shrunk.

Yet the sites appear to have reached their "natural limit," according to Elliot. In other words, they've topped out on the number of people who are willing to tolerate constant e-mail come-ons from supposed Russian brides. Professional con artists are everywhere online, so common that over 1,000 scammed online lovers regularly participate in the "RomanceScams" group on Yahoo.

There's also considerable disillusionment with amateur-con artists. Online daters don't quite play by the rules -- meaning they often don't list their exact age or weight, and don't publish a recent photograph.

Lying, it would seem, is standard practice online. In a survey Engage.com conducted late last year, 24 percent of respondents said it was OK to tell "little white lies" in their ads. One has to wonder if the other 76 percent were telling the truth. The most common lies that users admitted to involved income (21 percent), weight (16 percent) and age (14 percent).

Other factors also have cut into growth for online dating sites. Social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook provide what are effectively free online personals services for younger singles.

And, perhaps most important, the novelty element of online dating has faded.

"The need to lurk is naturally declining," Kaufman said.

Match: Plenty of room to grow
She claims her dating site is different, of course. Engage.com invites friends to introduce would-be lovers to each other, mimicking real-world matchmaking. The site was co-founded by Trish McDermott, a former Match.com executive who's now a critic of standard dating sites. Yet there is no evidence that the new approaches taken by Engage.com and other next generation online dating sites are reversing the declining interest.

Still, reports of the demise of "traditional" online personals (including my own from last year) are premature. Match.com still has 1.3 million people paying more than $20 a month. Jane Thompson, Match.com's vice president and general manager for North America, said the site has 7 percent more paying members than last year. That's a business virtually any Net entrepreneur would be jealous of.

"There are say 22 million people in the U.S. who are single, online, open to a new relationship and have never used an online dating site," she said, adding that the site signs up 60,000 people – both lurkers and paying customers -- every day. "I wouldn't say we've reached a natural limit."

But you can't help but sense a hint of desperation is the firm's new advertising campaign, "It's OK to look," which is obviously aimed at the drop-off in lurkers. So is the site's new "Voyeur's Guide." One version of the home page now includes a fetching picture of a male member with the quote, "There's no way I'm confessing to anything." That's a far cry from the wholesome, family friendly, "we'd never encourage extramarital dating" image Match.com worked so hard to cultivate in recent years.

After all, if online love sites are having trouble getting Web surfers to stop in and look at pictures of men and woman who want a date, they're obviously going to have a harder time converting lurkers into paying customers.

That was the conclusion of Elliot's report. Essentially, he said, those who aren't already dating online have decided it's not for them.

"A recent survey shows that non-users wouldn't trust the people they found on dating sites, are uncomfortable with paying for dating services and are afraid of sharing personal information," he wrote. "If new product or marketing approaches could win over consumers who still find paid dating services psycho-socially uncomfortable, user growth could again accelerate. However, JupiterResearch remains skeptical."

So apparently, do the would-be Valentines out there.

When André-Tascha Lammé was granted a judgment of $3,500 last month in a Sacramento, Calif., small claims court, he heard gasps.

"You could hear people in the courtroom saying, 'You can sue telemarketers?'" he said. You can. In fact, you can make some decent cash for your trouble.

Lammé started getting pelted with calls from mortgage brokers last year, just as his adjustable rate mortgage was about to reset. Like many consumers, he quickly reached the boiling point over the frequent interruptions. But unlike many consumers, the computer programmer took the time to educate himself – perhaps owing to the spirit of his grandmother, a lawyer for several decades – and quickly discovered the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.

"It specifically deals with unwanted calls," he said. "For each violation, there is a $500 penalty." Who gets that money? The call recipient. Lammé read on and found he didn't have to hire a high-priced attorney to pursue the penalty fees – he could file the case himself.

So far, Lammé has won $6,000 in judgments against telemarketers in three cases. He's not a lawyer, but by filing in small claims court, he's spent no more than $100 in court fees and scarcely more than an hour of his time on any case. Now he wants you to do it, too.

The Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991, signed into law by George Bush the elder, led to creation of the ragingly popular Do Not Call List. But tucked away in the bill was another important provision that entitles consumers to take what's called a "private right of action." For each violation of the act, consumers can sue for a $500 penalty. Violations include calling after a consumer has told a company to stop, or failing to provide the consumer with a copy of the firm's Do Not Call policy.

In his most recent case, heard in January in Sacramento, Lammé was awarded $3,500 for seven violations allegedly committed by Country Club Mortgage Inc. of Visalia. David Mitchell, vice president of Country Club Mortgage, said he couldn't comment on the litigation.

Suing a telemarketing firm might sound like a paperwork headache beyond the means of most people, but it's not, said Lammé. Small claims court papers are easy to file, he said. In Sacramento County, he doesn't even have to walk down to the courthouse. He can file online.

"It only took me five or 10 minutes to file," he said. "No more than a half-hour total."

In two prior cases, Lammé didn't even have to go to court. Two other companies settled with him for about $2,500 after he filed his case.

Web-filing streamlines the process

Suing telemarketers is not new, but Web-based court forms have made it much easier. Electronic filing is slowly becoming standard at small claims courts across the country, said Emily Doskow, editor of "Everybody's Guide to Small Claims Court."

"It's very consumer friendly," she said. "It's been growing in popularity for the last five years."

Despite Lammé's success, Davids don't typically triumph over Goliaths in the venue, said Stuart Rossman, director of litigation at the National Consumer Law Center in Boston.

Consumers who pursue a small claims case after frustrating fights with their cable provider, cell phone company or a retail electronics store are in for a rude awakening, he said. In almost all those situations, they long ago waived their right to sue by agreeing to mandatory binding arbitration for disputes.

Don't remember doing that? Well, you did, virtually any time you signed a contract with a service provider, used your credit card or even opened a shrink-wrapped piece of software you purchased at an electronics store. Binding arbitration agreements are everywhere, and they virtually eliminate a consumers' ability to bring small claims court cases.

"Courts will say, 'You have agreed to arbitration, we can't get involved,'" said attorney Ed Rapacki, who is challenging arbitration clauses in several cases around the country. "At small claims, (the defendant) will file a motion to dismiss or to compel arbitration. They'll say, 'Here's the contract, here's the arbitration clause.' And the judge will order you to proceed to arbitration."

The legal basis for mandatory arbitration dates all he way back to the Federal Arbitration Act of 1925, which was designed to allow two parties to streamline court proceedings.

But Rossman said arbitration has turned into a one-sided arrangement that nearly always favors the corporation and forces consumers to unknowingly surrender their rights to use the traditional court system.

"There are a number of things that organizations like banks are doing to protect themselves in those (contracts)," he said. "Mandatory arbitration prevents individuals from bringing claims ... and they are difficult to defeat."

An organization named StopBMA (binding mandatatory arbitration) has been trying to call attention to the issue of arbitration agreements. More information is available at GiveMeBackMyRights.org.

Lammé is a lucky litigant for two reasons: Congress made it clear that penalties awarded under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act should go to consumers, and he is suing companies with which he has no contractual relationship, and therefore can't have signed arbitration agreements.

How to file

If you are interested in pursuing a small claims case against a telemarketer, Lammé has set up a Web site with instructions at KillTheCalls.com. It includes a handy list of links to various small claims court instruction pages all around the Internet.

In most cases, your small claims court will be located at the county courthouse in the same building as your superior court.

The real trick to successful small claims cases is adequately serving the defendant with a summons indicating they've been sued and must appear in court. That means you'll have to provide the court with a viable address and preferably the name of a corporate executive or officer. That's sometimes easier said than done, but often you can find the information on the state Secretary of State's Web site.

On court day, it's important to bring supporting paperwork organized in an easy-to-read format. Lammé always brings a copy of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act to hand to the judge. The trials are informal, so you won't need to learn any legal jargon to plead your case. You might feel nervous or intimidated, but acting as your own lawyer is not as hard as it seems, Lammé said. He recommends going to court a day or two before your case just to become familiar with the courtroom procedures.

"Small claims judges are ... sympathetic," to the legally uninitiated, he said. "The judges give the benefit of the plaintiffs."

You only get one shot to make your case. By filing in small claims as a plaintiff, you waive your right to appeal the verdict or file in any other court.

One other bit of bad news: If you win a judgment, you will likely have a tough time collecting, particularly if your defendant resides in another state. You'll no doubt have to pay additional court fees in an attempt to collect. But you will have time on your side -- in New York and Massachusetts, for example, you have 20 years.

Because Lammé has sued firms that can't disappear overnight, he has been able to collect on his lawsuits. But he's not in it for the money, he said. He thinks consumers' lawsuits are the best way to end unwanted phone calls.

"If you sue these people, they're going to get the message," he said.

You can try to hide from the Internet, but it will find you. And so will data thieves.

The latest story of leaked data is a clear lesson for those who think steering clear of online shopping makes them safer.

Last month, customers who shopped at the brick-and-mortar stores of discount retailers TJ Maxx and Marshalls (both operated by The TJX Companies, Inc.) got the bad news that a hacker had stolen their personal information. Shoppers who paid by credit or debit card had their data stolen; in cases where customers returned merchandise for a refund, driver's license information also was stolen. The theft dates back to 2003, the company says.

The company hasn't indicated how many consumers were affected, but a memo sent by Visa USA to member banks and viewed by MSNBC.com said "the breach involves millions of card accounts across all major payment brands."

The story exposes this truth: Shopping offline is just as risky as shopping online. In fact, shopping offline is shopping online. Or, as computer security expert Avivah Litan of Gartner likes to say, "The store is the Internet."

That's because when you shop in a retail store, your card data ends up stored in a company's computers, which are ultimately connected to the Internet.

TJ Maxx is about as far from a risky, hip Internet site as you can get. And yet, its shoppers were hit by ID theft just like someone who shops online every day.

News of the TJ Maxx leak came as a shock to Red Tape reader Katie Slosarik.

"I, like millions of other Americans, shop frequently at a TJX CO. store, using my credit card or a check to pay for my purchases. I cannot believe they had been stockpiling financial data on their servers … from 2003! What could they possibly need that data for?"

Retailers don't need shoppers' data for more than a few weeks, but they keep it anyway. Think of it as a bad habit, kind of like leaving expired milk in the fridge. Programmers are data pack rats, and they have long had the habit of keeping data around just for the heck of it.

And because the data is connected to their network and, ultimately, to the Internet, it is just as accessible to thieves.

Most data leaks from 'real-world' stores
In fact, security forensics firm Cybertrust researched 160 data leaks involving retailers during 2006 and attributed 80 percent of them to brick-and-mortar stores.

"Many of the large compromises are not related to e-commerce," said Bryan Sartin, vice president of investigative response at Cybertrust. Criminals don't care where their victims shop, he said, they simply target "organizations that handle great volumes of data."

It makes sense that criminals target brick-and-mortar stores, Litan said. Criminals who steal credit card numbers turn them into cash by creating counterfeit cards and selling them to other crooks for their shopping sprees. The best counterfeit credit cards are produced by criminals who manage to steal all the data stored on the magnetic stripe of the legitimate card -- including a secret code banks can use to verify authenticity.

Retailers are supposed to discard the magnetic stripe data – obtained only by physically swiping the card through a card reader -- after they use it to verify the card, but they often don't.

Then, when the data is stored on corporate servers, hackers who break in are sure to grab it for use in counterfeiting.

These secret codes are generally unavailable e-commerce hackers, who are raiding databases of transactions, which are built by consumer purchases, who enter only account numbers and other basic information into Web sites when making purchases.

"The pot of gold is getting the magnetic stripe information," Litan said. "They can't make perfect counterfeit cards unless they have that code."

Retailers are supposed to discard the magnetic stripe data, but of course, they often don't. When it is stored on corporate servers, hackers find it, copy it, and they have their pot of gold.

Because so much attention has been put on e-commerce security, in some ways, brick-and-mortar shoppers are at greater risk, Litan said.

"You need to be more afraid of the gas pump than shopping online," she said. "This is a surprise to consumers, and even my clients. But people have been so focused on protecting Internet commerce they forget about real world commerce and forget the real world is on the Internet."

Security standards ignored
For years, the credit card associations have been instructing retailers to improve security standards, and in particular, to avoid storing personal information. A set of security standards promoted by Visa and Mastercard -- known as the PCI (Payment Card Industry) -- was supposed to be implemented by stores last October. But so far, only about one-third of the nation's largest retailers are PCI-compliant, Litan said. The shortcomings are obvious from the continued news of data leaks.

As in the TJMaxx case, data stolen from retailers can go beyond credit cards. Sartin said he's seen hackers delve deep into retail computer systems to target loyalty card data, which includes detailed purchase histories and other personal information.

"Consumers should be very careful who they give that data to," he said.

But most consumers don't have much choice, Litan pointed out -- like TJ Maxx buyers who wanted refunds and were forced to fork over a driver's licenses.

"What are you supposed to do, not shop?" she said.

Banks should do more
Consumers aren't liable for fraud committed using their credit cards or debit cards. As long as fraud is spotted quickly and reported, they have little trouble recovering from the incident. Still, it's a nuisance -- automatic payments must be resubmitted using the new cards, for example. And there's no telling what hackers might do with more sensitive information, like the driver's licenses stolen from TJ Maxx.

Litan says banks should take more responsibilty for the mess. There are 5 million retailers in the U.S., she said, and it's unfair to expect all of them to become financial security experts. It's also impractical to expect all of them to stop saving consumer data.

"Banks keep shifting the problem to retailers, but banks must strengthen card security as well," she said. "The problem is banks aren't doing enough to change the payment systems."

That may not last forever. While the steady drumbeat of data thefts continues, there is evidence suggestion the thieves are becoming more sophisticated, Litan said. In the TJ Maxx case, for instance, criminals who stole the data quickly distributed it around the world and began making fraudulent purchases, making it harder to stop the fraud.

The pattern followed a similar large credit card heist last year that published reports tied to OfficeMax, a charge the company denies. In that theft, criminals managed to make thousands of fraudulent purchases worldwide before banks were able to put a lid on the fraud, Litan said.

"This stuff is not going away," she said. "The criminal gangs are just getting started."

And they are after your personal information -- whether or not you shop online.

You might carry your cell phone and your wallet in different pockets, but the distance between them keeps shrinking as companies figure out new ways for your phone to vacuum dollar bills out of your back pocket. Ignore them at your peril.

The price of basic, pay-as-you-go text messaging has jumped 50 percent at most carriers in recent months, which means everyone should have a bulk message plan now. But that should be the least of your worries.

Premium text messaging -- with prices that start at 49 cents but range up to $30 monthly subscriptions -- have exploded in popularity. The services allow consumers to participate in television game shows, receive daily horoscope messages and hundreds of other services. But consumer advocate Edgar Dworsky says many consumers are confused about the price they are paying for these simple messages, and the cell phone industry is at risk of repeating the 1-900 number fiasco that dogged telephone providers into the 1990s.

Then, consumers complained so much about unexpected charges from pay-per-call telephone lines showing up on phone bills that Congress eventually passed a law to reign in 900 number advertising.

Keeping the services clean is critical for television networks, which in the past 12 months have seized on premium texting as a critical new revenue source and tool for building viewer loyalty. Text messaging plays a crucial role in Fox's hit show "American Idol," NBC's "Deal or No Deal," CBS's "Big Brother" and a host of other "unscripted" shows.

Consumers have yet to balk at one-time premium text fees they pay – which are generally about $1 – to play along with prime time TV game shows. But they are complaining about text messaging that automatically triggers subscription services.

Still, Dworsky, who runs a consumer protection Web site named MousePrint.org, is concerned that premium text message fees aren't disclosed clearly enough In fact, many consumers may not have even heard of premium text messaging.

'No oral disclosure'
In some advertisements, Dworsky says, an announcer will urge consumers to send a quick text message to sign up for a service or play a game, while a large message on the TV screen displays the instructions. The premium fee is only shown on the bottom of the screen in fine print.

"There is no oral disclosure of the fee," he said. "And the visual disclosure isn't up long enough and isn't printed in large enough type for the average person to catch." Indeed, in some ads, the disclosure language slides up quickly, then disappears off the bottom of the screen just as quickly.

Dworsky points to one television ad that urges consumers to send the word "Love" to a 5-digit number. Daily love advice text messages follow, at a price of $30 a month. The cost is revealed only at the end of a 35-word disclaimer that runs across the bottom of the screen in small print that is a fraction of the size of the text message instructions.

And while the small print says subscribers under 16 must get consent from "the bill payer and/or parental approval," there is no practical way to keep kids from signing up.

Netherlands-based Glomobi.comruns the "love" text message service. Repeated attempts to contact the firm through its customer service e-mail address were unsucccessful. The site lists no contact phone number, other than an automated line used to cancel service.

But in the frequently-asked-questions section of Glomobi.com, the site addresses accusations that ads aren't clear.

"Glomobi never advertises with free content. Not in our adds on television and not on our website," it says in one section, in answer to the hypothetical comment, "I was billed for your content but your ad said it was free." And in another area, it indicates that "all the advertisement material(s) clearly state (either visually and/or verbally) that this concerns a subscription service."

Not-so-free-ringtones
Premium text message subscription services began getting a bad name last year, when consumers started reporting phantom charges on their cell phone bills after downloading what they thought were free ringtones.

That happened to Chris Lee, a software consultant who lives outside Boston. He discovered repeated $9.99 charges on his cell phone after downloading a set of ringtones that he thought were free. When he did, he was enrolled in multiple services and had a hard time disconnecting.

"These charges appear without any description … on the phone bill and it's up to the consumer to figure out which company is billing them and how to cancel. It is up to the consumer to cancel each of these individually," he said. "It's like a credit card gone wild."

Verizon Wireless spokesman Jeffery Nelson said the company has received complaints from some consumers about premium text services, and some third-party providers have been banned. But he said other consumers are happy with premium texting.

"I think there's an expectation of a payment" when viewers vote for something they see on TV," Nelson said. "But they don't expect to be billed forever."

ITV: As simple as TXT
In the past two years, two technical hurdles have been cleared that opened the way to mainstream text message marketing campaigns. Most text message services now work across all cell phone carriers – in the past, consumers could only text within individual carriers. And the advent of "short codes" – those five-digit numbers -- has made marketing campaigns much simpler. Marketers can buy short codes that act as shortcuts for consumers who want to fire in a quick message, rather than forcing consumers to enter 10-digit telephone numbers. Vanity short codes (such as Pepsi, or 73774) are even available from the Common Short Code Administration for $1,000 per month.

The innovations have allowed premium texting to become the missing puzzle piece in the quest for the Holy Grail of interactive television. For nearly a decade, television networks have tried all manner of devices to get consumers to interact with their favorite television shows. It turns out that handy cell phones do the trick nicely.

"I have my cell phone with me like a remote control," said John P. Roberts, vice president of digital media at GSN, which operates a popular game show based on text messaging called "Playmania." Texting a message is far easier than telling consumers to head to their computer and log on to a Web page to participate, he said. Only 2 to 4 percent of watchers played along when they had to use the Web, he said, but 15 to 20 percent of Playmania viewers play along with their cell phones.

Last season, some 57 million people voted in "Deal or No Deal's" Lucky Case Game, according to the Wall Street Journal. Some of those entries were sent in for free via NBC's Web site, but a sizable chunk came from cell phone users paying 99 cents a pop. An NBC spokeswoman declined to offer a breakdown on how the votes were cast.

TXTing explosion
Text usage is up across the board. Some 12 billion text messages were sent in June of last year, up 100 percent from the previous year, according to the most recent statistics from industry group CTIA.

No comparable statistics on the number of premium text messages are available, but clearly more consumers are combining premium texting and TV watching. A survey by The Mobile Marketing Association of a consumer panel found that only 8 percent of consumers participated in interactive television texting campaigns in 2005. Last year, 29 percent did.

The MMA publishes guidelines for television marketers to follow when conducting premium text message campaigns. They call for the notice of the fee to be shown in 10-point type on the screen for 10 seconds. The charge also should be "clearly stated, both visually and verbally." Consumers also should receive a thank-you message indicating the fee paid, a bit like a receipt.

Executive director Laura Marriott said her agency has not received any complaints about game-show style TV-texting campaigns.

"The majority (of complaints) have been about the subscription services," she said.

At NBC, the company says it does all it can to make consumers aware of text messaging charges. (MSNBC.com is a joint venture between NBC's parent company, GE, and Microsoft.)

"This concerns everybody. … It's not good for the business," to confuse consumers, said Vivi Zigler, executive vice president of digital entertainment and new media. "We need to go as far as we can to be able to prevent that." She acknowledged, however, that there isn't much NBC can do to keep kids from sending premium text messages in response to shows.

Still, Dworsky says networks and stations aren't doing enough. He says there is frequent omission of oral disclosure by narrators, leaving the only warning about fees to the small print at the bottom of the screen.

Just a game, or gambling?
He also is concerned that many of the games, which often include a cash prize giveaway, don't follow rules governing sweepstakes. Some share characteristics with gambling, he said.

GSN's "Playmania" appears to be a raging success. It was recently expanded to six nights of live shows each week. Home contestants send text messages at the urging of a host for a chance to compete in on-air word puzzles for prizes of $100 or more. Contestants for each puzzle are picked at random, according to Roberts. Mobile phone text entries cost 99 cents apiece. Contestants can also enter for free using the GSN Web site. Those who pay to play also receive a "fun fact" or a game beamed to their mobile phone for their 99 cents.

On a bulletin board devoted to the game, some players criticize the program for stringing users along, convincing them that there are few players competing for the prize in order to solicit entries.

"I came to the realization that they're not rushing to put new players on so that people will get the impression that nobody else is calling and that they're practically guaranteed to get on and solve the puzzle and win some quick money, when all they're really doing is throwing their dollar bills at GSN like I did," wrote one.

Roberts said his hosts don't engage in those kinds of tactics, and in fact the show has gone to great pains to ensure its fee disclosures are clear and that there are free ways to play.

"People who enter for free have the same chance to get on as people who pay," he said. "Being one of the first networks out there to do this, we really are cognizant that we (need to) do this right."

Legal definition of an illegal lottery
The issue of how many people are playing has caused trouble for similar interactive games shows in the United Kingdom. In January, regulators in the U.K. issued a report warning text-in games shows that they might be running afoul of that nation's gaming laws. The report urged popular shows like "The Mint" to release odds information and warned the shows "generally look and feel like gambling." Regulators urged the show to disclose the odds of winning, which would generally involve sharing statistics on the number of players for each game.

In the United States, the difference between a promotional sweepstakes and gambling is fairly clear, says Joseph Lewczak, a lawyer who consults with marketers that operate sweepstakes games. Illegal lotteries have three characteristics, he said: prize, chance, and consideration. Take away any of those elements, and you have a legal promotional sweepstakes. Consideration essentially means entry fee, and chance means luck. By allowing free Web site entry, and by making the contest a game of skill, sweepstakes generally stay on the right side of the law.

"Choosing the winner based on chance would be considered an illegal lottery," he said.

He cautioned that the games must be true games of skill, however. He could imagine a situation where regulators might take a closer look at premium text games to make sure they "aren't just another form of gambling."
But Dworsky challenged the notion that these services genuinely provide a true free means of entry, however, because only three in four adult Americans have Internet access.

Dworsky wants U.S. regulators to get involved. The Federal Trade Commission sets rules for 1-900 numbers – including requirements of verbal disclaimers, and a chance to disconnect without fee during the first few moments of a call. But the agency has not yet set any rules for premium text messages, spokeswoman Claudia Bourne-Farrell said.

Parents who are worried that their kids might sign themselves up for expensive text subscriptions or vote too many times on television shows can call their wireless carrier and ask that premium text capabilities be turned off.

Verizon spokesman Nelson also recommends that consumers watch their bills carefully and call their carrier if unexpected charges appear.

"The carriers want to hear from you, and need to hear from you," he said. "This is a new space, a new area. I don't think the burden should be on the consumers. I think the burden is on (the carriers) who are opening up the gates to this."