Consumer Information Regarding Identity Theft Prevention

by erin on October 13, 2010

When someone hears the term identity theft, they get scared by this term. Others just simply shrug it off. Maybe it’s because they don’t understand much about it and you might be one of those people who shrug it off. If this is you, there are some things that you should know about identity theft prevention, for it is an important one.

Every day, someone has their identity stolen. There are a number of ways that this can happen and many think they are exempt from this. It can happen to anyone. There have been some who have been young when this happened and have later found in life that their identity has been stolen. That’s how scary it can be.

Mainly, the way people can steal your identity is by learning of your Social Security number. However, some can get them from credit cards or other things that have your personal information. That is why it is suggested that if you are going to throw things away, you should really shred the information so no one can get access to your information. What you will find is that identity theft is described when anyone uses any of your personal information without you even knowing it to defraud the systems.

Another thing that not enough people do and really should do is that if you can’t find a credit card or other card that have your information, you should report it lost or stolen. This is the biggest way that people gain access to who people are and how they steal their identity. If you have anything that you think might be lost, it’s important to report it as lost or stolen so they can get a fraud alert out.

What a fraud alert will do is notify authorities if your information including your Social Security number is used. When this happens, if they find that your identity is used, they will step in. The person who is caught will be given time in prison for stealing your identity. From there, you will want to close the accounts that have been used.

In order to know what this looks like, you must learn how they gain access. We already mentioned one. They sometimes dumpster dig for papers that have important information on them. Others scam you on the phone. They call you acting as if they are your bank and get the information that they need. There are many other ways as well.

Some ask how long it takes to restore your identity. This can take years. This is why you need to take every precaution that you can to ensure that people don’t get access to it. There are a number of reasons that they use this as there are many scams that they perpetrate. There are ways to see if your identity has been stolen as many go years before they realize that this has happened. One thing is that you want to check your credit report each year. The other thing is that you want to keep an eye on your checking account and other bills.

Now that you know a bit more about Identity Theft, you can do what you can to prevent it. Many don’t know enough about it. This is why reading things like this can be very helpful. Everyone thinks that it can’t happen to them but it really can as it happens to nine million Americans a year.

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