What is Identity Theft
Who you are is important to you. It’s certainly not something you think about every day, but when you realize that you’ve lost your identity to a thief who is using it to make fraudulent purchases or even steal from your bank accounts, who you are and how to protect your identity becomes absolutely critical.
What is Identity Theft?
In the simplest terms, identity theft is having the information that defines who you are in the eyes of credit card companies and banks stolen. This might include:
- Your Social Security Number
- Your credit card numbers
- Your full name
- Your address
- Your phone number
- Your login information
- Your bank passwords and username
- Your bank account numbers
- Identity questions such as your mother’s maiden name
Thieves can get this information far more easily than you think, and they certainly don’t need every item in the list to start making charges in your name. In fact, you likely present opportunities to potential thieves every day, multiple times over.
How often have you:
- Sent your credit card with a waiter or sales person?
- Put a card back in your wallet without checking to see that it is yours?
- Written down your account number, login name or passwords?
- Throw out old bank or credit card statements?
- Left your mail in your mailbox for any extended period of time?
- Opened a tab at a bar or restaurant?
- Given your credit card number over the phone?
- Downloaded a program from the internet?
- Opened an attachment?
- Clicked through a link in an email?
Increasingly these are activities that are simply parts of the day. Unfortunately, they are also the most common ways in which your identity is stolen. The majority of other people are just as honest as you are and would never think to snap a picture of your credit card while you pay at a convenience store or send malware to your computer, but it only takes one dedicated thief to make your life truly a living hell.
The Most Common Means of Identity Theft
Identity theft is distressingly commonplace. Knowing the most typical means of obtaining your personal information can help you keep it safe. The most common means of identity theft include:
Retrieving statements and information from your trash.
Throwing out a bill after ripping it in half or not at all makes it easy for a thief to snatch it right back up. It’s illegal to touch the mail in your mailbox, but once you throw it away, it’s fair game – even if it’s your bank statement or a preapproved credit card offer.
Malware you’ve downloaded onto your computer.
When you click to download a new program, a ringtone, a song, a joke or anything else online, you run the very real risk of downloading a Trojan as well. This malware can track your keystrokes or record images of your screen and send the images back to a perpetrator.
Phishing your information through fraudulent emails.
One of the most distressing methods of obtaining information is through emails that appear to be authentic. You see an email from your bank demanding immediate action to your account. You open the email, click through to the login page, enter your information…and just gave the thieves everything they needed to know to empty your bank account.