What can one do to prevent or at least minimize the chances of identity theft?
Fatdude427 asked:
Are there any cautionary measures that one may take to help ensure that one doesn’t become a victim of identity theft?
Are there any cautionary measures that one may take to help ensure that one doesn’t become a victim of identity theft?
Why has identity theft become so widespread today?
Have you or has anyone you love become the victim of identity theft?
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Here are a few websites with a lot more information on identity theft and the prevention of it:
There are many more, but these should offer quite a start.
On short, what you can do is be very careful with what kind of information you’re giving away and to whom (especially the social security number and credit card information, but full name – phone number – address just as well).
Why it is so widespread – well, for one thing because a lot of places are asking for the social even if they don’t really need it (you shouldn’t have to give your social over the phone when you’re making a doctor’s appointment; yes, it should be on your file probably, but that should be taken care when you’re actually going to the doctor, not over the phone). On the other hand, since all financial services are now mostly online, a lot more people receive phishing (looking as if they were coming from your bank, when in fact they’re not) e-mails and once they follow the links in there, whoever sent those fake emails now have your account id and password. Or people don’t have a good firewall and a good antivirus set up, so that it’s easy for even an unexperienced hacker to take hold of some kind of personal information. From here to identity theft it’s only a very small step.
As for the last question: no, and I hope it’ll never happen.
Alex.