Your ID Is Stolen. That Sucks. Now What? 9.3 Million Victims.

Hope this never happens to anyone, but what if it does? How will you know? What do you look for? Who should I call if you think something is wrong? Tons of articles advising you on what if your credit is stolen telling you to call your credit card companies, credit bureaus, banks, etc. But what if you think you're just being too cautious? STOP. You can never be too cautious. Here are the steps I take to prevent my ID from being stolen: - I use the government's gift of a free annual credit report. And take the time to look through your entire history to make sure nothing seems out of the ordinary. Your credit report will often contain numbers to the reporting financial company, so call them if you have any questions. - I monitor my online account activity on a weekly basis. Credit cards, banks, investment, etc. I try not to let anything slip. - Don't submit your financial or personal information to any sites linked from emails if at all possible. - Discard personal information securely. Shred, burn, destroy all personal information. I've debated just throwing things away, and I admit, I do sometimes. When I get lazy, I'll rip a credit application in about 6 pieces and throw some of it in one trash can and the rest in another. - Call my financial institution whenever there's a question mark. Should I find something suspicious, I would immediately track down exactly when and where that happened, and then take the appropriate steps to stop it. Here are some quotes taken from an article on msnbc.com:

Study results indicate that consumers who spot fraud online suffer an average theft of about $500. Consumers who wait for paper records and suffer ID theft suffer average losses of $4,500.

So monitor your credit card and online account statements! So your ID is stolen...now what?

Also promising, she said, was a result showing average consumer time spent dealing with personal records cleanup from ID theft is now 28 hours, down from 33 last year.

Do you have 28 hours, which probably doesn't account for everything, to talk to someone over the phone explaining to them that you are, well, you? Remember,

"The fact is that nobody is more effective at preventing and protecting fraud than the individual," he said.

Here are some references in case ID Theft strikes you: http://www.consumer.gov/idtheft/ http://www.complaints.com/directory/2004/april/18/11.htm http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6866768/ http://www.ssa.gov/oig/hotline/when.htm http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/fraud/idtheft.html http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/credit/idtheft.htm And you may be interested in Credit Monitoring services. Also, check out this post by Frugal @ My 1st Million At 33.