Victim Of Identity Theft - How To Protect Your Credit

2009-07-17T12:42:00.000-07:00

To cut or minimize the hazard of becoming a victim of identity theft or fraud, there are some simple steps you can take.

If you are a victim of identity theft, your liability for charges can soar the longer the crime goes unreported, you should not be liable for fraudulent charges, but you do need to clear your name right away.

If you detect that you are a victim of identity theft you should place a fraud alert on your credit reports right away.

Under California law, when you give a copy of the police report to the credit bureaus, they must cut off the fraudulent accounts from your credit report. Under the Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act, the Federal Trade Commission is in charge for receiving and processing complaints from persons who believe they may be victims of identity theft, providing informational materials to those citizens, and sending those complaints to suitable entities, including the major credit reporting agencies and law enforcement agencies.

In the United States and Canada many citizens have reported that unauthorized persons have taken cash out of their bank or financial accounts, or, in some cases, taken over their identities altogether, running up vast debts and committing crimes while using the victim's name. In many cases, a victim's losses may include not only out-of-pocket financial losses, but significant additional financial costs associated with trying to restore his/her reputation in the community and repairing erroneous information for which the criminal is responsible.

According to Identity Theft Labs, the number of Americans who have had their private and personal information compromised is staggering: over 217,000,000 in three years, resulting in 10 million victims every year, to avoid this happening to you get the best credit protection service on the market today!

Identity theft victims are allowed up to 2 additional reports for free in the year after filing an extended fraud alert. In most states, security freezes are offered at no charge to identity theft victims and for a relatively small fee for non-victims.

If your identity thief is aggressive and gives no indication of ceasing to use your identity to obtain credit, consider using the security freeze to cut access to your credit file.

If a civil judgment is entered in your name for your imposter's actions, contact the court where the judgment was entered and report that you are a victim of identity theft. If you think you've become a victim of identity theft or fraud, act immediately to decrease the damage to your personal funds and financial accounts, as well as your reputation.

The FTC has more information on identity theft reports. Although the FTC does not itself examine identity theft cases, they share such information with investigators nationwide who are fighting identity theft.

After resolving any identity theft disputes, request that the companies send you a letter stating that they have discharged any fraudulent charges or closed disputed accounts. If an account was opened fraudulently and was identified in a police report as being fraudulent, you can give a copy of the police report and request that Equifax or the other two nationwide consumer reporting companies block the reporting of the fraudulent account in your credit file.

Victim Of Identity Theft - How To Avoid Becoming A Statistic

Victim Of Identity Theft - How To Protect Your Credit