Keeping Your Personal Information Safe

One of the big threats to your financial stability and foundation is identity theft. This is a growing crime, and you are quite likely to, at some point in your life, experience firsthand the effects of identity theft or fraud. Therefore, it is of great importance to your personal financial situation to ensure that you do your best to stunt the effects of identity theft. Here are some ways you can protect yourself.

Catch identity theft quickly

You may not be able to entirely prevent identity theft, but one of the keys to limiting its financial impact on you is to catch it quickly. Here are some things you can do:

Check all of your statements carefully. Balance them all — bank, credit card, etc. — each month and check the charges and debits.

Check your credit report regularly. You get one free credit report a year from the major credit bureaus. If you plan it out right, you can check your report once every four months to remain in the loop.

Investigate spurious and suspicious charges to your account.

When you do see a discrepency, report it immediately. You need to alert your bank or credit card, the credit bureaus and law enforcement officials. The sooner you act, the less liability you have.

Reduce your chances of becoming an identity theft victim

There is probably no way to completely immunize yourself to identity theft. However, you can reduce your chances of becoming a victim:

Do not send personal information (account numbers, passcodes, etc.) in response to an email request, or give it in chat rooms.

Make sure that your online transactions are secure (look for the “s” after the http in the address bar).

Use online security features to create a firewall that makes it harder for others to see what you are doing online. Also, protect your computer from spyware.

Verify the authenticity of links sent to you from email. Phishing is a technique that sends you to a dummy site through a link in your email in order to get your information.

Find out why you need to give your Social Security number when asked for it. Ask if there is another means of identification you can use when calling and speaking on official business on the phone.