With the holiday season now behind us, many are looking forward to roughly eleven months of simplicity before holiday fever takes over yet again. The only leftover crumb from the latest December-to-remember is, quite possibly, the credit card bill you anticipate will be arriving soon. Despite the urge to engage in rampant consumerism, you're confident that you were reasonable with respect to the purchases you made, so you have no worries with respect to the expected charges. And yet, you find your jaw dropping when you peruse your statement, because the balance is far larger than you ever imagined - even in your worst nightmare. However, after careful review, you realize that there must be some kind of mistake; most of the charges are for things that you never bought. But then, like a bucket of cold water, realization hits: someone else made the charges under your name - you're an identity theft victim!
Identity theft occurs when someone uses the personal identifying information of another person in order to commit a crime - usually a fraud of some sort. It has been hailed in the media as the fastest-growing crime in the country, with an estimated 60,000 people becoming victims every month. Small wonder, then, that scenarios like that above will probably become truth in fact for many people over the next month.
The holiday season is a particularly active time for identity thieves. Not only is the average consumer flashing their charge card, credit card and checkbook more often, they are also distracted by the hustle and bustle of holiday shopping, deals, etc., going on around them. The long and short of it is that criminals may not have to work as hard to get your information. And once they have it, you are seriously up the creek.
For criminals, the first page of the identity theft handbook is often to open up a line of credit in the victim's name. This is one of the simplest ways for them to get the identity theft ball rolling, and might explain why credit card fraud is the most pervasive form of identity theft. Moreover, most victims will not discover the crime immediately. In essence, the criminal uses a line of credit that the victim is completely oblivious to and probably won't discover until well after the crime is committed.
In brief, identity theft is a prevalent and growing crime. It is insidious by nature, often making it hard to detect. Thus, it's probably in your best interest to take preventative measures beforehand rather than curative measures afterwards.
Identity theft occurs when someone uses the personal identifying information of another person in order to commit a crime - usually a fraud of some sort. It has been hailed in the media as the fastest-growing crime in the country, with an estimated 60,000 people becoming victims every month. Small wonder, then, that scenarios like that above will probably become truth in fact for many people over the next month.
The holiday season is a particularly active time for identity thieves. Not only is the average consumer flashing their charge card, credit card and checkbook more often, they are also distracted by the hustle and bustle of holiday shopping, deals, etc., going on around them. The long and short of it is that criminals may not have to work as hard to get your information. And once they have it, you are seriously up the creek.
For criminals, the first page of the identity theft handbook is often to open up a line of credit in the victim's name. This is one of the simplest ways for them to get the identity theft ball rolling, and might explain why credit card fraud is the most pervasive form of identity theft. Moreover, most victims will not discover the crime immediately. In essence, the criminal uses a line of credit that the victim is completely oblivious to and probably won't discover until well after the crime is committed.
In brief, identity theft is a prevalent and growing crime. It is insidious by nature, often making it hard to detect. Thus, it's probably in your best interest to take preventative measures beforehand rather than curative measures afterwards.
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To find out more about identity theft defense, then visit Sherman Wills's site for more on the best identity theft protection tips and tactics.
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