Identity theft
Monitoring
You may
already know that identity theft is the fastest growing
crime in the United States, but you probably don’t realize
that the fastest growing segment of identity theft is
children.
The FTC
reports that 5% of the 255,000 victims of identity theft
in 2005 where under the age of 18 which is up 40% from 3%
in 2003. Most of these cases take place very early on with
over half occurring prior to the age of 6 according to the
Identity
Theft resource Center.
Awareness
seems to be the biggest problem in helping to prevent
child id theft. A recent Experian-Gallup poll found
that 68% of respondents had heard little or nothing about
identity theft crimes against children.
But, that
doesn’t mean that children aren’t falling victim to
identity thieves at a rapid rate. That same poll
found that 7% of respondents knew a child that had been
victimized by identity theft.
Identity theft
perpetrated against children can be particularly
debilitating because it is often years or decades after
the crime occurs that the victim becomes aware.
There are
hundreds of stories of adults that attempt to apply for
their first line of credit only to find that their
identity had been stolen years earlier while they were
underage and, as a result, their credit was destroyed
before they even had a chance start practicing healthy
credit habits.
Unfortunately,
identity theft
crimes against children can be hard to track because
children don’t apply for credit or review a credit report
to identify suspicious activity. That being said, there
are steps that parents can take to lower the risk of their
kids becoming victims of identity theft.
First, keep
social security cards out of your kid’s hands. In fact, no
one in your family at any age should be carrying a social
security card. We recommend that you keep all of your
family’s sensitive documents in a home safe, safety
deposit box or at least a locked filing cabinet.
Next, keep a
look out for any suspicious mail that arrives at your
house in your child’s name. If credit card offers, late
payment notices or other suspicious items show up, don’t
assume they are mistakes. Follow up with the company that
sent them to determine the reason they were sent in the
first place.
Finally, your
entire family should be protected by a proactive identity
theft prevention service. These services, such as
LifeLock , will monitor activity on your credit
report and help prevent identity thieves from making
victims of you or your children.
Another
common activity of identity theft
criminals is to commit utilities fraud with your
personal information. A thief may open up new phone,
electric, gas, or other utility service account using your
information.
This
scheme can extend into accounts for cell phones, cable TV,
sewer and water, and some criminals have been known to
even rent apartments, all in your name, and like bank
fraud, the smart criminals will have all bills and
statements sent to a different address so you will not be
aware of any suspicious activity until after the damage is
already done.
This
crime be sometimes have less negative impact on the victim
because if the criminal is obtaining monthly services
using your name, they may very well wish to keep these
services active and will actually pay the bills. But if
they dont pay or stop paying later on, then it again goes
against your credit history and can affect your ability to
obtain and maintain these necessary services.
A more serious
type of identity theft activity is government
documentation fraud where a criminal can use your personal
information for many different purposes. They may get a
drivers license or state ID with your information and
their picture.
One common
practice of identity theft is the usage of someone elses
Social Security number for employment purposes. While this
practice does happen with people who are on the run from
the law or wish to stay hidden for some other reason, it
is more likely that an illegal immigrant without a Social
Security number of their own will commit this crime.
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