Identity Theft and Ways to Avoid It

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Identity Theft and Ways to Avoid It

• Nick Mehandzhiyski
• MIS E4

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What is Identity Theft

• Identity theft is when someone uses your
  personal information like name, SSN, bank account
  or Credit card number for fraud or other crimes.
  FTC (Federal Trade Commission) estimates that 9
  million Americans become victims of Identity
  theft every year. Your stolen identity can be
  used for various things like rent, obtaining a
  credit card, getting a bank loan, purchasing a
  phone or car etc.

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How do Thieves Steal Your Identity?

• Dumpster diving they rummage through trash to
  get bills or bank statements with your personal
  information
• Phishing they pretend to be financial
  institutions and sending you emails try to get
  your personal information
• Changing your address they divert you billing
  statements by changing your address (USPS
  website)
• Old fashion stealing by physically stealing
  your credit card
• Pretexting they use false pretenses to get your
  information and use it for obtaining credit cards
  or bank loans under your name (a pretexter may
  call, claim he's from a research firm, and ask
  you for your name, address, birth date, and
  social security number).

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How to protect Your Identity?

• The best for of preventing identity theft is
  awareness. If you know how it works you can do a
  lot to prevent it
• It is estimated that at least 20 of the people
  who became victims of IT did not realize it for a
  long time or after a damage has been made. The
  most effective way to find out if you are a
  victim is obtaining a credit report on a regular
  bases.

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What is a Credit Report and Ways to Obtain it?

• A credit report contains detailed info about
  your debt, credit use, bank account status,
  recurring payments etc. By reviewing it you can
  easily detect any discrepancies and determine if
  youre a victim of identity theft. In the US
  federal law mandates that a person can obtain
  their credit report free of charge. The only
  official website for this is www.AnnualCreditRepor
  t.com. The site is maintained by the three credit
  bureaus and takes less than 5 minutes to get a
  printout of your credit report.

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What to do if Becoming a Victim of Identity
Theft?

• Place a fraud alert on your credit reports and
  review your credit reports correct any
  inaccurate information like mismatches in your
  name, SSN, address, bank accounts etc and file an
  Identity Theft Report with the credit bureau
  issuing the report
• Immediately close the account you believe is
  opened fraudulently.
• File a complaint with FTC (online or phone)
• File a report with your local police department
  when you go there bring with you a copy of your
  FTC complaint, Credit report and any other
  supporting documantation.