Combatting Identity Theft By Ellen Debboli
There are thousands of articles available to provide tips on how to avoid having your financial information or identity stolen. Some of these are common sense items such as shielding the keypad when entering sensitive data on a public telephone or at an ATM. Others require a bit of technical savvy, such as checking to make sure your on-line purchase is secure, never allowing your credit card information to be stored by merchants on-line, and never using on-line passwords that are easily guessed or that you use for other things. This is all great advice. But how do you know you've been victimized? And once you establish that you have been, what steps must you take to protect your assets and stop the theft?
How do I know I am a victim?
Identity theft is used to cover a wide variety of crimes, from common theft of credit card numbers to thieves who start entire false financial lives using your personal information. This sort of theft is more complicated to identify but has the potential to be financially devastating.
