A little while ago, one of my friends mentioned to me that she had to go through a series of paperwork because her daughter’s identity had been stolen. Her daughter was less than 2 at the time! Since then, I have heard several stories about child identity theft. Apparently, children make great targets for identity thieves for a number of reasons – one being that it can take years before the crime is actually discovered. Last Friday, I spoke to Lyn Chitow Oakes the Chief Marketing Officer of TrustedID to learn more about this trend and about some signs to keep watch for.
It’s no surprise that identity theft is on the rise, especially in these economic times, so I learned the following six tips to help protect families:
1. When enrolling your kids for various things (i.e. at medical offices/school/various activities), ask if they really require specific personal information regarding your child, especially there social security number. Protect their information as much as possible, because thieves will try to steal their identities in order to get jobs/social security benefits/etc.
2. Make sure that the personal information in your home is locked up tight. You never know what caregivers/various visitors to your home will do with that information. Funny story – I was talking about this topic with a group of my friends that were over for a Bible discussion group. One of the guys casually said, “I bought someone’s social security number for $500 a long time ago”. We all looked at him like, “What?!” Then we laughed, because he’s a very different man now. However, it just illustrated the fact that you never know the backgrounds or potential threat that family and friends present when it comes keeping your identity safe.
3. Be careful with your mail. That’s often where thieves get their information. Be especially aware of credit card offers that come through the mail. Don’t just throw them away, because someone can easily activate the offer.
4. Be careful with the information that you provide on social media sites. A lot of times people let their guards down. Really, all that most expert thieves need is a name, your birth date and a little more information in order to steal your identity!
5. Make sure that your child does not have a credit report. They really shouldn’t have one. If they do, there’s probably a problem. Also, train you kids not to share their personal information with strangers (i.e. birthday, address, etc.)
6. Be proactive. Protect the entire family with an identify theft protection program. There are many services out there including TrustedID. They are different from credit monitoring agencies that simply let you know what has happened after the fact. Identity theft programs attempt to prevent theft with a variety of services (i.e. they find out if kids have credit reports and unravel the mess if they do; they monitor adult personal information in public and private databases to make certain that stolen information isn’t on the market; etc.). They’re also relatively inexpensive (some family programs are less than $20/month for the entire family including elderly dependants).
In any event, after learning this information, I’m definitely going to be more careful in the future. In reality, it’s impossible to prevent someone from stealing your identity if they really want to. Identity theft is widespread with its own crime syndicates. However, it is important to do what we can to protect our children/our families to the best of our abilities. An ounce of prevention…
To learn more about identity theft, how it happens and how it affects you, visit the TrustedId site.