Identity theft affects millions of people per year, and a lack of awareness on how cybercriminals operate puts you at risk. Protecting yourself requires vigilance, and that means knowing the best methods for staying safe.
In this article, we’ll cover some of the common identity theft scenarios, and steps you can take to keep your identity out of the wrong hands.
What is identity theft and what are common cases?
There are many different forms of identity theft, but the majority fall under the umbrella of financial fraud. Credit card fraud, for example, is the specific crime itself, while identity theft is the consequence. Some jurisdictions such as Australia consider credit card fraud to be in the “identity crime” category.
But there are many other types of identity theft besides credit card fraud, and the average person needs to know how to protect themselves from the latest methods criminals are using to obtain personal information. In this article, we’ll go over the most important things you need to know about identity theft, and how to protect yourself.
What information are criminals after?
There are several key pieces of your information that criminals are after. These typically include:
- Social Security number
- Mailing address
- Bank account or credit card number
- Bank card PIN
- Email address
- Computer or email passwords
When it comes to stolen credit cards, banks are able to issue freezes and void transactions, to mitigate damage. A credit card being stolen is an inconvenience but there are numerous ways to protect yourself.
More dangerous are frauds where the criminal has a wider variety of your personal information, that would enable them to take out loans in your name. Many criminals prefer to use payday loan websites, taking advantage of risky lending practices.
How to protect yourself from identity theft
Cybercriminals are prolific, but there are numerous ways to protect yourself online. However you also can’t forget protecting yourself in the real world as well.
Use identity protection software
There are a lot of steps and things to remember for completely securing your online identity. Regular password checkups, monitoring your financial accounts, and avoiding phishing scams. For a lot of these things, it could be better to use an all-in-one identity protection software.
Protecting yourself from ID theft using identity software like IdentityGuard can be useful as it uses AI-driven monitoring to immediately send you alerts if your information is used somewhere without your knowledge, such as a credit report being requested from a lending company.
This doesn’t mean you can entirely drop your guard, but a lot of the vigilance will be done for you.
Shred physical documents
Many financial accounts let you enroll for paperless billing and statements, but you may choose to receive physical documents. If you do, make sure you properly dispose of identity-containing documents such as document shredding or incineration.
Dumpster-diving is still more common than you think, especially as criminals know people are more focused on cybersecurity than physical security.
Consider locking your credit report
You can restrict access to your credit report by placing a freeze on it. This will not affect your credit score, and it prevents identity thieves from opening new credit accounts in your name, since the creditors will not be able to see your report.
A credit freeze also does not apply to your current creditors, so you can still continue using your credit accounts as normal.
Use biometrics over passwords
Biometrics provide stronger security than passwords, especially when combined with 2FA (two factor authentication). Using biometrics eliminates many of the risks associated with passwords, so overall it’s a better practice where you’re able.
Biometrics haven’t been proven to be 100% foolproof, as stories of facial scanners being fooled with photographs are found, but someone would need to go through a lot more effort and dedication to clone your fingerprints.