Some Tips On How To Fight Identity Theft
Prevention is always better than cure and even in the case of identity theft you would certainly be much better off learning how to fight identity theft and thus prevent it from happening rather than being lax and have your identity stolen and then end up having to spend all of your energies and resources in recovering your lost identity. The fact of the matter is that of late as many as, it is believed, a tenth of all Americans have had their identity stolen and the numbers of such crime are continuously growing without showing any signs of abating.
Dire Consequences
Identity theft certainly means having to deal with many dire consequences including adversely affecting your credit rating which in turn will often take years to repair and thus, it is quite easy to see that the need to fight identity theft is a lot more urgent than you may have suspected. Fortunately, there are a number of tried and tested ways by which you can fight identity theft and it is worth looking at them one by one.
To begin with, you can fight identity theft by being extra careful about old documents which must in any case be stored away very carefully or even destroyed so that no unauthorized person can gain access to them to subsequently rob you of your identity. It does not take rocket science to figure out that such documents must be stored out of sight and reach of everyone other than you.
When you move from one place to another, you must inform your bankers, utility companies as well as other concerned persons about the change in address because misuse of letters sent to a previously used address are most often the easiest way by which thieves can rob you off your identity.
Also, you can succeed in your fight against identity theft if you makes sure that when you stop using a bank account or credit card that you formally close these accounts and cards, and in addition, you do not ever leave them dormant because it could easily let in unscrupulous and enterprising fraudsters who will then gain access to your identity and then rob you off it.
Another effective step with regard to fighting identity theft is to ensure keeping your ATM cards, debit cards as well as your credit cards where only you can access them, and in case you lose any or all of them, you must immediately inform the concerned agency about such loss. Also, you should try and change both PIN number as well as your password to something that is hard to figure out and never make the mistake of writing these down; rather, you should commit them to memory and not carry them about on your person.
Though there is no absolutely foolproof method by which we can ensure that identity theft never occurs, by following the steps outlined above, you will have a much better chance to fight identity theft and thus prevent loss of money, time, and more importantly your identity.
