Identity theft has become a serious problem. Despite your best efforts to control the flow of your personal information to keep it to yourself, experienced identity thieves may use a variety of methods to gain access to your data.
When you are victim of id theft, take the following four steps immediately, and maintain a record with details of your conversations and copies of all correspondence.
- Place a fraud alert on your credit reports, and review your reports- contact the toll-free fraud alert on your credit report. One company will contact the other two, placing an alert on their report, too. Placing a fraud alert entitles you to free orders of your credit reports.
- Close accounts you believe have been opened fraudulently or altered- speak to the security or fraud department representative. Ensure you follow up in writing to credit cards and banks involved. Then dispute the concerned account.
- File a Police report- a copy or a report number can help you deal with creditors and/or track id thieves possibly getting them behind bars.
- Contact the Federal Trade Commission- Filing a complaint with the FTC can assist by providing information to Law enforcement on a national level to track down id thieves.
When a crime where your purse is stolen, car broken into or house burglarized, ensure that your personal documents are accounted for. If not, report them immediately to the police and obtain further guidance from them.
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Identity theft
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