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It’s an undeniable fact that keeping your personal information 100 percent private is impossible. When you use your card at a restaurant, copies of your card can easily be made. When you go to your doctor, photocopies of your driver’s license are insurance policy is made. You can’t eliminate identity theft altogether but it is definitely possible for you to make it harder for thieves to steal your identity. Among the things you can do include:

1. Do you really need to fill that out? Don’t automatically answer every blank portion of every application form. Ask questions about any suspicious information-gathering activity of creditors, merchants, educational institutions or employers. Ask if sensitive portions can be left blank.

2. Who needs to know your number? Stop telling people your credit card number. If someone calls you asking for it, be sure that you are talking to a legitimate agency first before revealing any financial data. Remember that unless you made that call, it difficult to determine is the person you’re talking to is for real.

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Every day there are innocent victims of organized criminal activities from internet shopping.  Personal information over the internet is a common occurrence nowadays, where identity theft takes place from criminals stealing your account details.

Internet shopping is quite a general trend, where most times it is more convenient and often cheaper to shop online than go elsewhere for the same product.  However, this makes identity theft a very easy game for criminals who seek easy targets.

As an internet shopper, you need to beware of the phishing scams that take place.  It can save you from a lot of heartache from disputing with banks in an attempt to prove that you did not make fraudulent transactions over the internet.  You can be liable for losses if you are unaware of tips that can help reduce your risks of identity theft taking place.

Your email account, user ID, credit card, bank account, social security and driver’s license numbers are common targets for identity theft to begin.  To ensure that you do not make the mistake of providing criminals easy access to your personal details online while you shop, ensure you are dealing with legitimate organizations first.  This can extend to email scams that can ask you to respond to confirm account details, pretending to be popular organizations.  If you have a gut feeling that it is false, then do not respond.  The best way to ensure it is legitimate is to call the company yourself. Read the rest of this entry »

There are those people that check their credit card statement every month, and there are those that check only here and there, or do not even bother at all.  Why is it worth checking your credit card report?  Identity theft is on the rise in the US, checking your credit card report is a very quick and simple way to prevent suspicious activities.  You may think it won’t happen to you, but the increase in identity theft is increasing by the minute.  In recent years, credit card identity theft has taken over 10 million victims in a single year alone.

Identity theft can take a criminal only a few minutes to achieve, in contrast, it can take months to settle a credit card fraud dispute, so it pays to check your own credit card report for a few minutes or to get a professional service to do it for you, especially if you use credit cards often.  Credit card reports can be accessed free of charge from banking institutions at least once a year.  The things to look out for are any charges on your credit card that you did not incur, or any odd locations or companies you usually do not purchase from.  Most times you may not be liable for the losses, however, debit card accounts generally have less protection against identity fraud, and may be liable for any losses. Read the rest of this entry »

The popularity of social networking sites has made it hard for everyone not to join the bandwagon. MySpace and Facebook are just among the websites that require personal information. Some people who decide not to include their birthdays for fear of identity theft. Soon though, they are tempted to include it to avoid the hassles in logging in.

However, it is important to protect your identity in the internet no matter how ‘friendly’ the site is. It is critical not to put sensitive information on the site. When you make use of the internet in chat, emails and the like, your information is virtually exposed to anyone who cares to look. Your exposure to people will increase as you increase your number of friends. Take note that you will not be protected from people who have other intentions other than being friendly. The story of people having stalkers is proof enough that social networking site is a playground for all kinds of criminals. Read the rest of this entry »