Can I Handle an Identity Theft by Myself or do I Need a Service Like Lifelock?

I'm continuing to get calls from people who believe they have had their identities stolen or who may have been the subject of one of the big "data thefts" that have afflicted so many companies. These cases likely are not yet ripe for handling through litigation because there are really no serious damages at the point where the consumer learns his or her identity has been stolen. The cases we handle are those where the consumer has had his or her credit damaged by the identity theft situation and has been unsuccessful in getting it straightened out.
Nonetheless, here are the steps you need to take, and take at once, if you believe your identity has been stolen or your personal information has been stolen or compromised:

1. Immediately file a police report, and get a copy. Make several copies because you will need several copies. Several means as many as two dozen, and you may have to make more as the situation progresses.

2. Not all police agencies want to take identity theft reports. If you run into a police officer or a sheriff who will not take your report, ask to speak to his or her supervisor. Eventually you will find someone who will take your report.

3. It is not necessary if you have filed a police report, but you can also file an identity theft report with the Federal Trade Commission at www.ftc.gov. If your local police station positively will not take a police report, then file your report with the FTC and make several copies.

4. Immediately contact all three major credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax and TransUnion) and request an extended fraud alert. A regular fraud alert is good for only about 90 days and is effectively useless, since many current identity thieves will deliberately wait 120 days or so after the identity theft to attempt to use your identity, knowing of the 90-day fraud alerts. You need to get the longer, extended fraud alert. The fraud alert will mean that any creditor will have to call you at a specified number before extending credit in your name.

5. Contact any involved creditors and provide them with copies of the police reports. They should reverse any identity theft charges or accounts once you provide them with a copy of the police report. If they will not, then you contact my firm about possible representation.

6. If you think you know where your identity was stolen, contact that location and ask to speak with a manager about it, as the employees may be employed by an identity theft ring and you would want the manager (who hopefully is not involved with the identity theft ring) to know about the situation so he or she can contact the police privately.

7. Monitor your credit reports at least quarterly. Promptly dispute any false or inaccurate information on your credit reports, whether or not it relates to the identity theft. If you cannot get false or inaccurate information removed after a reasonable period of time, contact my firm about possible representation.

8. Obviously contact any banks, insurance companies or investment houses where you maintain accounts and let them know of the possible identity theft situation. They should be alerted to notify you if anyone tries to make any large withdrawals from any of your accounts.

If you do these things, it's likely you will not lose anything other than your time to the identity thief. That's a whole lot better than losing your life savings.