LINEARX is committed to providing the highest security possible for customer order entry and processing. Credit card fraud has become a growing and serious concern for all e-commerce mechants. The FBI reports that in the year 2000 over 1,000,000 credit card numbers were stolen. There are two fundamental issues with which we are concerned: (1) protecting the credit card data provided by customers, and (2) rejecting fraudulent credit card orders. Both of these issues are addressed in the following sections.

Hacking database files residing on LAN servers, connected to the Internet, which contain customer data, has been the primary mechanism by which virtually all credit card theft has occurred. Essentially all of the network operating systems whether they were Windows NT, Linux, Unix, or Novell have all been compromised at one time or another.

To completely eliminate the risk of a security breach, we have taken the simplest and most reliable approach -- WE DO NOT STORE YOUR CREDIT CARD INFORMATION. This completely eliminates the potential risk of any hacker obtaining valuable data from our systems.

Some customers believe that faxing or phoning in their order is more secure than using OnLine order entry. However it should be understood that virtually all credit card theft to date has occurred by hacking of database files. Whether an order is placed Online or by phone/fax matters little when the information ends up in the same database files. For merchants who store this credit information, it is those database files which are the primary security risk. Again, we do NOT store any customer credit information so no matter how we receive the data it is never retained in any database files.

We believe that Online order entry is one of the most secure methods of transmitting your data. The data is immediately encrypted and sent via Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) from our server to VeriSign, and from there to the processing/banking institution on a highly secure private financial network. Your encrypted transaction data packet travels across the Internet to VeriSign in less than one second.

We are continuing to implement new order checking methods, algorithms, and technology to detect fraudulent orders. We take credit card fraud very seriously and report all fraud to one or more of the appropriate enforcement agencies: VISA, AmericanExpress, Federal Trade Commission, United States Secret Service, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

We do not accept credit card orders with a different ship-to then that of the credit card holder. Furthermore, we will not accept credit card orders with an email address from a free/anonymous account. If we suspect that a credit card order is fraudulent then we may request wire transfer payment or some other appropriate means. In some cases we may contact the cardholder directly to verify legitimate usage of the card. We reserve the right to reject the order if reliable payment cannot be assured.