How to Prevent Identity Thieves From Harming Us Financially?

Identity theft can be quite costly financially and it could pose a huge, ugly ordeal for many people. If it happens, damages can be very difficult to reverse and the best thing we can do is to prevent it from happening. Identity theft occurs when scammers obtain our bank account numbers, social security numbers, date of birth and other essential information. After our information has been stolen, they could actually create a birth certificate and other identification documents based on our personal details. They can be used for various purposes that can benefit them and harm us financially.

It is important for us to get latest credit report regularly, from any of the major credit reporting companies. In this case, we are allowed to obtain a credit report for free each year. In this case, we should carefully check our credit report and check for accounts that we don’t use. Unless it is absolutely necessary, we should avoid carrying our checkbook. Identity theft could occur when scammer forge checks and steal checkbooks. They can even be persistent enough to gather shredded paper and re-arrange them to get our personal details. In any case, we should try to guard our mother’s maiden name, date of birth and social security number with extra care.

If we are careful enough, it will be very difficult for thieves to steal our identity. Paid bills and other documents that contain personal information shouldn’t be placed in the mailbox. Instead, they should be taken directly by the mail carrier or to the Post Office. Many thieves try to steal our mailboxes to get our information, especially documents related to our financial matters. They may actually look for documents that contain our signature. With special solutions, it is possible for them to dissolve all the inks, with the exception of our signature.

Get a reliable paper shredder. The overall cost of paper shredder should be a lot less than the amount of money we need to spend after our personal information is stolen. Old documents should be shredded, including tax records and bank records should be destroyed. It is a safe bet to immediately shred documents that we no longer need. It is a good idea to choose a paper shredder that doesn’t only cut paper into small strips. The paper should be cut both horizontally and vertically into very small pieces, and then scrambled. This will make it impossible for identity thieves to steal our identity.

It is important to be aware that we shouldn’t trust any email that asks us to click a URL about us. If we want to open our online banking account, we should open a new browser tab and type the URL manually. This will prevent us from visiting a website that has been modified to look identically to our online banking website. It means that we shouldn’t click any link from eBay, IRS, PayPal, ISP providers, bank, lending service and others.