If someone were to tell Frank Abagnale that present-day technology would make the things he got up to in the 1960s much easier, he wouldn’t have believed them.

The 67-year-old — whose early life as a con artist is chronicled in Steven Spielberg’s film “Catch Me If You Can” — said he would have thought technology would have advanced to protect people better from such crimes. But nowadays, Abagnale said, it is 4,000 times easier to do what he did.

“Technology breeds crime,” Abagnale said. “Always has, always will.”

Between the ages of 16 and 21, Abagnale lied, assumed fake identities and did what he could to survive following his running away from home after learning about his parents’ divorce. From pretending to be a pilot for Pan Am Airways and traveling the world, to impersonating a pediatrician in a Georgia hospital, to posing as an attorney after passing the bar exam in Louisiana, he evaded capture from the FBI for five years.

Eventually, at age 21, Abagnale was caught and served prison sentences in France, Sweden and the United States. He was released after five years on the condition of teaching and assisting federal law enforcement agencies. Since then, Abagnale has not left and has been with the FBI for 40 years — 32 years longer than what he was court ordered.

“I owe my country 800 times more than I can ever repay it,” he said.

On Wednesday, Abagnale shared his story at an AARP Fraud Watch Network event at the Microsoft Corp. campus in Redmond.

And following his talk, Doug Shadel with AARP expressed a sentiment many in the room probably shared.

“I am really glad you are on our side,” Shadel said as audience members laughed along.

GIVING CRIMINALS THE OPPORTUNITY

During his talk, Abagnale said security information breaches occur because someone was doing something they weren’t supposed to do — such as taking home a company computer and making it accessible to criminals — or someone didn’t do something they were supposed to do.

One example of this happening was a few years ago when government security was breached and the Chinese government was able to gain access.

“We allowed them to steal it,” Abagnale said. “We gave them that opportunity.”

In addition to offering up these examples, he also offered tips and advice on how people can protect themselves from identity theft.

One major point he brought up was the potential dangers of social media, advising people to keep key information of their birth place and date of birth off the sites. And with the advances in facial-recognition programs, Abagnale said people should not share photos of themselves facing straight into the camera. Instead, he said they should post photos with other people, where their faces are a bit obstructed or fuzzy.

“Otherwise, you’re just saying, ‘Come take my identification,’” he said.

Abagnale said this easy access online takes away the type of legwork he had to put in during his conning days, which included everything from acquiring the right type of printer to be able to print fake checks, to figuring out which warehouse to go to in order to get a Pan Am pilot uniform.

PROTECTING YOURSELF AND OTHERS

The preferred victims of identity thieves are children, Abagnale said. This is because when using identities for crimes such as credit card fraud, children are not going to be needing to check information such as their credit score until they are older and have to buy a car or apply for a home loan. And the younger, the better, Abagnale said, as this gives the criminals a longer period to assume the child’s identity.

“That (Social Security) number can be used and sold over and over again,” he said.

To protect their children better, Abagnale advised parents to guard their children’s Social Security numbers and to be careful of where they share that information.

Abagnale also advised people to avoid using debit cards as it gives identity thieves immediate access to their money. Instead, he said, use credit cards. That way, if a card number is stolen, the lost funds would be the credit card company’s, not yours, Abagnale said.

He said people should also make it impossible for people to get a hold of physical evidence of their information by shredding such documents. Abagnale recommended a micro-cut shredder as this makes it impossible for people to piece the documents, credit cards or CDs back together.

“You want to use the right shredder,” he said.