Identity Theft: How to Avoid it

Identity Theft: How to avoid it.

Getting right to the point, identity theft is on the rise, and yes there are some simple things you can do to help prevent it from happening to you. 

First of all, and most importantly, do not use your social security number carelessly. Your social security number is in fact a financial number. That is it’s original intention. You don’t have to give it to anyone you don’t want to have it, and you can do this without repercussions, being threatened with recourse or discipline. If someone else wants your social security number so they can route it into activity for their personal gain or benefit, … there is something very wrong with that picture. Don’t give it up, but rather separate yourself from the invasion and take time to write it up for your own personal records incase your identity does ever get stolen so you have some background to give law enforcement to work with. 

Should you find yourself doing this, … detail is important. Use names, dates, times, locations and document any conversations in great detail. If you have tangible material that could be photocopied or photographed, … do it. Make it all part of your notes. Keep these records in a very safe place like a safe deposit box or in a file at your attorney's office. Don't use your attorney's real name around the people in question. An identity theft suspect may snoop around trying to find out how much trouble they are in. Remember, ... you're running the defensive, ... not the offensive. 

Remember, Identity thieves are very skilled heavy-duty chronic liars. Once they get in trouble they will lie like never imagined to stay out of jail. Your documentation of questionable encounters to your sensitive information can serve as a barbed wire fence against them in their lies to go free. They will also lie and make threats or intimidate people into submitting the information. They may also lie about the legal knowledge they have. 

Honestly, the only entities that should have your social security number are your employer, your financial institutions, your medical provider, the government and your tax contractor who does your taxes. Nobody, and I mean ‘NOBODY’ else has the right to your social security number. If someone says they are with a government agency as a reason for wanting your social security number, ... tell them "if you're from the government, you don't need it because you already have it." Then document your encounter. 

Contractors, utilities companies, investigators, landlords, libraries, car dealers, furniture stores are just a few entities that might tell you differently, … but their wrong. They’re dead wrong.

Over the years the use of our social security numbers has become so careless and flagrant that it’s just assumed all these other entities have this right. They don’t! That’s why America is battling this new crime that is out of control. We did it ourselves by our careless past. 

To give you a better idea of how heavily you should be safeguarding your social security number, … think of it this way. You wouldn’t walk around a crowded street without any clothes on would you? Of coarse not! Well, that is how personal you should be treating your social security number. It’s yours, nobody else’s. 

Identity theft costs America Unbelievable amounts of money. Not just at the victims end, but also banks, stores, services and of coarse the huge expense of all the man hours and leg work of law enforcement people involved in investigating the crimes. Anything you do to protect identity causes a good domino effect in these area’s because you’re making sure your life doesn’t make these area’s more stressed by the problem of identity theft.  

Who pays for identity theft? People like you and I of coarse. Every time an identity thief buys an appliance or automobile, the retailer who sold the merchandise doesn’t get their money of coarse. For a retailer or anyone else to recover these losses, the losses are pumped back into the economy in the form of higher prices for you and I. Is this fair? Sorry to say it is something that must be. You can’t expect a retailer to simply eat its catastrophic losses. They wouldn’t be able to stay in business. This is a sorry fact of life.  

Other things you can do to protect your identity may involve the way you do some things. Change some routine behaviors if warranted to do so in your situation.  

In my career of loss prevention I’ve seen good innocent people leave themselves open for the opportunities of identity theft.  

Lets go over some of these areas right now.  

See if you fall into the faults of any of the following behavior or habit flags that would warrant a change on your behalf to prevent future problems.  

First of all, don’t carry your social security card on your person. This is a document that should be kept in a safe place with other important documents such as with your birth certificate and vehicle titles. It shouldn't be readily available to the visitors of your home. Use a strong box, locking file cabinet or safe deposit box.

Next, in my career I’ve done plenty of foot patrols in commercial parking lots. It is simply amazing how many people leave checkbooks and credit card folios in their vehicles where they can be seen through the vehicle windows. These are smash and grab’s waiting to happen.

Never leave financial material where it can be seen or accessed by strangers. This includes your vehicle, place of employment, or the common areas of your home.

Yes, in office buildings I’ve noticed women leave purses out in the open such as their desk or cubical work area’s.

Don’t do this. You’re better off putting a purse in a locking area of your work environment. A locker if so available or use a locking file drawer if available. It takes less than 4 seconds for a purse to disappear. I can’t recall how many times in my career that I’ve given such reminders to people for their protection.

I’d like to talk about something else I’ve observed in office buildings in my career.

Your mail! A lot of people bring their mail to work to read it. This is something else you shouldn’t do. I’ll use a true story to tell you why.

I was patrolling the inside of an office building and as I past one area three men were making comments about another employees bank account. One man was initially overheard saying, “She don’t need a raise. Did you see her account balance on her desk.” This caught my attention because of the conversations content, (sensitive information).  

This resulted in me stalling my patrol through the building pretending I was examining the locks on some entry doors.

After another man entered the area, the first man buddy’d up to him and started talking about the information on a desk top again, referring to the coworkers account balance yet again.

The new comer to the conversation was in disbelief saying, “no way, show me.” I observed them head to the desk in question where it appeared an employee was balancing her checkbook and reviewing her bank statements. She was at the time away from her desk.

It was at this time I made my presence professional and ended up asking a total of 4 men for identification and informed them they were being entered on a security report for breeching the privacy and security of a coworker.

As I was wrapping up my interviews with these men, the woman who worked at this desk came through the stairway door carrying vending machine food. She saw her coworkers by her cubical being challenged by a uniformed individual and wanted to know what was going on. I told her. She reacted as if she were violated. I then got her identification and went back to my office to do the report.

The next day I had letter in my mail slot from the C.E.O. of the job site I was guarding.  

In the letter I received high praises for my observations and professionalism. The letter also explained that the employee’s behavior was unacceptable and most certainly nonproductive. Then it explained the outcome.

One of the four men was given a two day suspension, the other three men were told they wouldn’t be eligible for overtime for ninety days, the woman was told not to conduct her personal affairs at work.

This is a perfect true to life example as to why people need to really govern their sensitive information. This woman is lucky her violators were just a bunch of childish big mouths. She’s very lucky someone didn’t just simply steel all the material and use it for ill gain.

It is best if you review your mail and finances in the privacy of your home.  

Credit cards:

There are a lot of people out there carrying a wallet or purse full of plastic. If this sounds familiar, here’s something you can do to reduce the risk of unnecessary losses.

Select only one credit card to carry with you. Maybe make it an ‘all purpose’ card that can help you at any retailer. If you carry department store cards all the time, … this is a bad idea for several reasons. Having department store credit cards readily available is often the reason for binge spending, which leads to surprising credit card statements at billing time.

You don’t shop at department stores everyday. Don’t carry the cards everyday. Put them away in a safe place; carry them only when you’re going to use them. By doing this if your wallet or purse gets lost or stolen, you won’t have to call an entire list of credit card companies trying to freeze their accounts; but instead, by carrying just one credit card, you will have just the one creditor to call.

Did you know that stolen credit cards are usually charged to their credit limits well within twelve hours of them being stolen. The thief won’t waste any time doing this because he or she knows you’re on your end trying to freeze the accounts of your stolen cards.  

Something I do with my credit cards is something you may wish to try; … it’s your decision. I have never signed my credit cards. This should prompt the cashier at the point of sale to ask for picture identification to go with the use of the credit card.

In a perfect world all cashiers should ask for photo identifications with credit purchases. This would stop a lot of unauthorized credit card use. However this isn’t yet mandatory. Maybe someday it will be.

A select few credit card providers do offer the option of having your photo on the front of your credit card. Like I said, there are only a few that do this. Here too, this would be another good idea for mandatory practices to help protect the consumer.

Watch your waste:

This touches base with yet more on the job observations. Many times our agency had me do bank duty at a number of different banks. As the officer on duty, during a full shift I’ve seen countless people come into the banks on payday to cash their checks. In the process of doing this I’ve noticed a great many people tear their stubs off the paychecks and throw the stubs in the wastebaskets of the bank lobbies.

Folks, … this is the single most destructive thing you can do to yourself. Please don’t be this careless.

This one single piece of paper is an identity thief’s jackpot. Most payroll stubs have your name, social security number, your employers name, your wages and your wages year to date. Everything needed to start financial trouble in your good name.

I can’t recall how many of these I’ve taken out of bank lobby waste baskets while on duty and gave them to tellers to put in the shredder. To many to count, that’s for sure.

If security didn’t remove them from the waste basket, you better believe they would have made it to the trash hopper outside where garbage pickers would find them after banking hours. A law breaking television news crew looking for a story could find it. If that would happen, then the bank would undeservingly look bad on television, and your information still made it into the wrong hands before reaching a landfill.

Buy a shredder:

You may ask, … “why buy a shredder for just a couple pieces of paper every month?”

First of all I’d like to mention shredders have come down in price drastically compared to years ago, also there is a abundance of models to choose from, unlike years ago. Now days you can even buy shredders that will do computer disks and credit cards. This is a great investment.

Buying a shredder involves more than shredding pay stubs. Of coarse it does.

Some other things you may want to shred are old utility bills, that shoe box full of canceled checks from years gone by, your tax records that are over seven years old, personal mail and letters meant for your eyes only weather their from family or friends or business, extra copies of medical information you want to discard, … the list goes on.

What you don’t want to do is throw whole information about yourself into the trash. The less someone knows about you, the better.

Using a shredder can also put you closer to that ‘hard to get’ category for identity thieves. That’s exactly what you want. Discarding computer disks with sensitive information is another area of concern.

I have a friend who had years of tax information on a CD. Since these files were very old, he decided to throw the disk away after using sandpaper on it so it couldn’t be used in another computer. Okay, he had the right idea (safely discarding data), but he went about it the wrong way. I told him that too.

A computer disk (the CD or DVD, … even music, software and movie types) doesn’t record the information to the plastic surface of the disk. A lot of people don’t realize this.

Such disks are made of three parts. Two thin plastic disks, which are the top and bottom of the disk, … then the third part, the center, which is like a foil material sandwiched between the two disks. As these disks are manufactured the three components of the disk are pressed together with such force and pressure by industrial machines that the finished product actually looks like it’s just one piece (but it’s not).

When data is added to the disks, a laser device such as the drive in your computer transmits the data through the ‘non-label’ side of your disk, which is just a clear plastic surface. The laser transmits this data through the clear plastic to the ‘foil like’ material sandwiched into the middle of the disk. This ‘foil like’ material is the place that holds the disks data. Not the clear casing of the disk. The casing of a CD disk can be restored regaining access to its data. This is a fact. Music and record stores do it everyday for their customers. These stores have machines the size of your kitchen table that can resurface disks like these making them look brand new again. Even public libraries have machines like this to maintain disks that borrowers bring back with accidental scratches on them.

This is great news for those of you who didn’t know your favorite music or movie disk can be fixed if it’s scratched.

It’s useful information if you throw away data disks with sensitive information on them. Marring up the surface of the disk won’t do it. You have to destroy the disk.

Don’t, … DO NOT, … use your hands to bend a CD in half in an effort to break it. It will bend quite a way before it gives. When it does give, small pieces of razor sharp plastic will deploy all over the area and you or someone else could lose an eye or otherwise get hurt. This is where a disk shredder can come in handy. The machine can do it safely and the chopped pieces go directly into the shredder container.

These shredders that can do paper and disks are available at office supply, and department stores. Most of them are less than knee high and look like wastebaskets with a cover on top. Which means, for being a machine, they can blend in quite well with most home or office atmospheres as far as appearance goes.

Use your checking account very carefully. I say this with a reason too. I’ll use one example to get you thinking about what I mean.

I frequent my fare share of rummage sales. Granted, the ones I go to are in very good areas. On several occasions over the years while going to rummage sales, I’ve personally witnessed the careless use of checking accounts. A rummage sale is a great example of a place where you shouldn’t write a check. I’ll point out two very big reasons why.

When the checking account was invented numerous years ago, its original intentions were to pay bills by mail, … like your utilities and other bills. Over the last several decades people have become accustom to whipping out their checkbooks at every point of sale that they go to.

A rummage sale is one example of a place you shouldn’t write a check.

For your protection!

At a rummage sale, … your check ends up in the hands of a no-name stranger you’ve never met before. Can you trust that person? Can you ‘not’ trust that person? You don’t know. Unlike sending a check off to a utility company or financial institution for a monthly payment of something, … at a rummage sale you’re putting one of your checks in the hand of a stranger. Are they responsible? Are they a convicted criminal?

ARE THEY AN IDENTITY THEFT SUSPECT! You don’t know.

Why would you then give them a piece of paper with your name, address, bank name, bank account number and a sample of your signature?

I certainly wouldn’t. This is a chance you’ll never see me take. I visit an ATM or my bank before I go rummaging.  

It’s in the rummage sales best interest too.

We live in a society were people want to see exactly how much they can get away with.

If I were to hold a rummage sale, I wouldn’t take any checks. As the person running the rummage sale you run the risk of being stung by a individual writing bad checks. Since you’re not a major retailer or utility company with a legal department for such recourse, … you end up eating it along with the bank fee’s that come with a check that didn’t clear. It just isn’t worth it.

Sure you can file a police report. If the suspect has a fake name on the check, chances are you’ll miss out on the recovery of your losses.

I don’t even use my checking account to pay some people I know, but don’t trust. There are some people in my life that will never ever see the face of one of my checks. For these people, I use money orders. For me, it’s worth the 69 cents every month for these people for the reassurance.

Warning flags:

Do you have your doubts or distrusts on someone regarding these issues?

First of all I have to mention, … if you do, remember to remain peaceful and civil toward the individual. It is not your place to address them on a hunch and try to hang a label on them. ‘Act dumb and unknowledgeable’ of the concern around them to keep peace, otherwise you can get in trouble civilly or legally. You can still do this without giving up your sensitive information. Personally, if asked by one of the people I don't trust, ... I simply say, "I don't have any bank accounts". I also do this with phone service. If asked by a person that I can't trust, ... I simply say, "I don't have a phone".

Some warning flags involve the following. Do you know someone who knows more about you than you know about them, and are they making major purchases with the inability to stay employed, or they may be employed, but not well enough to support the large purchases they are seen making. Keep in mind banks and other lenders are very careful about how they loan big money because we live in a age where financial institutions are getting stung too often.

Example:

A person walking into a financial institution looking to by a home but is unemployed or has only a part time job that they barely live off of; Chances are the institution will send them skidding down the driveway on their butt. (Figure of speech)

Financial institutions are not in business to write unsecured loan contracts. The money they loan, … they’ll want back.

Be aware of people who complain they have no money all the time, but yet are seen spending big money on automobiles, projects, and lifestyle.

Are they a liar? As I said earlier in the article, identity theft suspects are skilled and catastrophic liars. All to often a individual who will lie about winning prize money, lottery money or talk about grants and grant money that in reality don’t exist.

Lies, lies, lies.

An identity theft suspect lies like this to mask the appearance of unexplained money and spending. Any observant person can notice this in itself. These are all reasons good enough to do a background check on someone. I've done just that on some people personally. I'm not talking about checking a courthouse website or just a $20.00 arrest record. The background checks I did on three people who I won't name were done through licensed and bonded agencies.

Why did I do this??? LIES! LIES! LIES! And tons of Civil, State, and Federal laws have been broken. All three of these people know each other.

I don't abuse having this information. I possess it and go on in life playing 'dumb'. This is the correct and peaceful way to buy and have background checks in your custody. Never run around spreading the information with mean intent. Hang on to it for the day you will need it, such as in a court case or restraining order.

Getting back on track about the lies.

What they don’t realize is that everything that comes out of their mouth can be verified as the truth or a lie. The person verifying the things said, only needs to know where to verify each source of information. Most of the time it is free.

Lotteries keep records of their prize & money winners. Anyone saying they won a lottery can very easily be verified.

Grants can be tracked through the person’s name. Grants aren’t just a check handed over to a person. There are huge paper trails for grants that are approved, as well as grants that were applied for but declined. There is a lot of paperwork, and a paper trail left behind for tax and Federal reasons.

Knowing someone fitting these behaviors is your key to simply ‘BE AWARE and BE CAREFUL’. Your best defense is detailed note keeping of any activities that come your way. Do not challenge the individual. Let the law do that if needed.

After reading this article, ... some of you may think 'jeepers, this was kind of aggressive, straight forward and not very pretty'.

You're right! But neither are the crimes of identity theft and other privacy violations.   On the other hand, ... become a victim of these crimes, and you'll feel this article wasn't worded strong enough. Trust me on that!

Go to your local library and learn your privacy rights. They are there for you and your protection. Learn them, use them, and protect them. They are your rights!  

Reporter Joseph Toth 

Washington Micro Bank BBS