Credit Repair And Identity Theft Often Go Together
There seems to be no end to the imagination of the people that steal someone's personal information and use it for financial gain, while ruining the credit history and reputation of an unsuspecting identity theft victim. There is an increasing need for companies that help with credit repair and identity theft is making their services much more valuable. Unfortunately, there are also scams that reportedly are going to help a person recover with credit repair and identity theft is their main goal.
When a person has become the victim of identity theft, it can take years to clean up the mess. Even if the theft has been reported and thoroughly investigated, simply proving they have been a victim is not enough for the major credit reporting agencies to wipe out the fraudulent information. It can be an expensive and time consuming process to affect credit repair and identity theft effects can hang around for years.
Once an identity has been used illegally, the victim may not be aware of the problem for many weeks or even months. In some instanced the victim was not aware of the problem until the thief failed to make a payment and with bills being sent to a different address, the need for credit repair and identity theft may not be known until they apply for credit and learn about an outstanding bill.
Assuring Personal Information Is Properly Protected
When reviewing options for credit repair and identity theft is a concern, no one should even consider information that arrives unsolicited. For one thing, credit reporting agencies will never start a conversation with anyone about their credit report. Emails may be received claiming to be from one of the major agencies, or from a company that can help with credit repair and identity theft problems, but unless the targeted person is fully aware they have a problem, odds are that the email is a scam attempting to gather personal information.
Credit repair can take time and while there are some legitimate companies that help with credit repair and identity theft, people can do the work on their own and clean up the mess that used to be their credit history. Companies guaranteeing they can restore a person's credit immediately, are not going to be able to remove any legitimate negative entries on the report, regardless of the promises they make. If they do manage to remove any items illegally, it is the individual that will be held liable for fraud.
