>now at 11. >two one hate >saying goodbye to 2024. >it's the end of the year >and ringing in a brand new year. >i'm hoping for 2025 to be an excellent year. >the bay area is getting ready to celebrate, while

millions around the world have already welcomed 2025. we take a look back at some of the year's wild moments and a look ahead. >hi, i'm sara donchey. we have made it to the final few hours of 2024 here in the bay area, and whether this year was a great one for you, or if you are ready to leave it behind, 2025 is just around the corner eitheray. in fact, it is already here for the people on the east coast. this is what it looked like in new york city's times square just about an hour ago, when they rang in the new year. for us, our fireworks shows have not started just yet. the big one, of course, is in san francisco, along the embarcadero, where people have been streaming in all evening to get a good spot to watch. our kelsi thorud is there. >reporter.

>>the chilly weather didn't stop too many. started off with some charcuterie. charcuterie and a little bit of brut, and we're about to go to the water bar and just have some oysters and have a good time. pete little told >us >>he grew up in >martinez, >>moved to san francisco. he says this will be >his >>first time ever taking in the city's new year's fireworks. i'm very excited to see them. i can't wait, i think they're going to be awesome. >happy new year, >mom! three. oh! >right. >>they told us they've seen the fireworks many times. so this year they decided to head over to the other side of the city to spend the evening with some family. my son and my nephews, are in their house and we are going to celebrate the new year together and open a champagne and then just enjoy it. koushik das told >us >>he and his daughter watched

the fireworks a few years ago. he's thinking about braving the crowds to watch them again this year. it's our third year here, and my daughter actually likes, you know, the fireworks here actually in 2022. she liked it very much. i think she will like it even tonight. also, person who's hoping to benefit from all of the festivities is seamus mcdonagh. he's got his pedicab ready to take people to and from their destinations. i can't recall how good it is, but it's better than regular nights and hopefully we'll have some fun. you know, whatever people's plans, it looks like they're going to ring it in >on >>a positive note. >look at >a bright 2025. happy new year, san francisco.

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- [announcer] the following is a paid presentation sponsored by lifelock. - i thought i'd be the last person on earth this would happen to. i change my passwords all the time, i shred my documents, and i lock my documents up, so i thought i was bulletproof, honestly. someone stole my social security number and filed a tax return in my name. - nearly one in four consumers in the u.s.

have been a victim of identity theft, but not you, yet. you check your bank accounts and credit, set up complex passwords, shred important documents. no one's getting past your protections. but the reality is, identity thieves don't have to because your information is already in the hands of others and out of your control. - i did everything right, but an institution that had my data didn't, and my identity was stolen. - [tom] from hospitals to your employer, government agencies to retailers, and so many other places you interact with, the information thieves need to steal your identity is in countless hands that aren't always as careful with it as you are. - our personal information, sensitive financial information, is out there in so many places that we absolutely have no control over. we were responsible for $75,000 in an auto loan

that we didn't even take out. - let me make this very, very clear. you could do nothing wrong, be 100% perfect about all of your security, and still be a victim of identity theft. - $110,000 of my hard earned money, gone. - i'm tom morris jr., and over the next half hour, we'll shine a light on the dark corners of identity theft and show you how to protect yourself against these threats with lifelock. - i thought we did enough to keep a nightmare like this from happening. - you feel violated. i did all the right things. - [tom] mercedes and jim have always taken their privacy seriously, so much so that, when they sold their house, they went out of their way to shred over 150 pounds of their old paperwork. - i felt so secure that i'd done everything that i needed to do to protect ourselves, but it wasn't enough. - [tom] while jim was living in another state for work,

he started to see signs they'd been compromised. - my husband called me up and he said, "you know, something strange is happening. i'm getting letters in the mail for an auto loan that i didn't apply for." and he said, "can you watch your mail?" - and just as i finished that sentence, she said, "well, i have a letter here from a bank." - and it was like, "congratulations, you've been approved for an auto loan in the amount of, you know, $75,000." i had goosebumps. it was just something that happened to other people, not to you. - [tom] when jim called the car dealership that sold the car to the thief, he couldn't believe what he heard. - and they told me, "well, this person never walked into the dealership." they never stepped foot? "no." i said, "do you have any identification from this person?" and they emailed me a driver's license. it was me, but it wasn't me. it was my connecticut driver's license with the picture changed, definitely not my signature. - it was frightening.

what happens if these thieves who are so savvy have taken out another loan and another loan? - and while this was going on, i kept getting the monthly invoices for the truck. they even went as far as to send me the keys. am i gonna be on the hook for $75,000? yeah, it's quite possible. - [tom] jim and mercedes never figured out how the criminals stole their information. the hard truth for all of us is our data is held by so many institutions and companies, it's almost impossible to know for sure who has it and what they do with it. - we realized that our personal information, sensitive financial information, is out there in so many places that we absolutely have no control over, and that's why we signed up for lifelock. who would think that someone could steal your face, your name, your address? i hope it never happens again, but if it does, i feel confident that we have lifelock. - [narrator] lifelock's advanced technology

monitors hundreds of millions of data points every second for potential threats, alerting you to the widest volume of threats others could miss, far beyond what you could possibly monitor on your own. and if you are a victim, you'll have a dedicated u.s-based identity restoration specialist in your corner who knows the steps to take and calls to make to fix issues on your behalf, guaranteed. plus, the lifelock million dollar protection package, including reimbursement for stolen funds, up to $1 million. get the protection you need with lifelock. - your social security number, nine digits that prove to the world that you are you. if your nine digits fall into the wrong hands, there's almost no limit to the damage criminals can do with it. good thing yours is completely random and impossible to guess, right? i'm here with bryan seely, a leading expert in cyber crime, to find out. bryan? - depending on which state you were born in and the year,