| Identity theft is a rapidly growing crime. In fact, various statistics place the number of victims of identity theft at anywhere from 400,000 to 700,000 a year. |
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| What is this crime and how does it affect me? |
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| Identity theft is a crime by which someone wrongfully gains access to your name and personal information. They use this information to get loans, rent property, make purchases or use your identity in the commission of more serious crimes. |
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| This can be a costly and time-consuming crime to recover from. But, with careful monitoring of your financial documents and sensitive information, you can help reduce your risk of becoming a victim. |
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| What can I do to protect myself? |
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First and foremost, be vigilant with your personal and financial information, especially your social security number. Here are a few
key tips to help you get started in protecting your identity...
and your finances: |
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| 1. Don’t give out financial information over the telephone or Internet unless you initiated the contact. |
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| 2. Don’t put outgoing bills with checks in your mailbox. Mail any envelopes containing checks, financial application forms or other sensitive information at the post office. |
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| 3. Consider getting a post office box or a locked mailbox, especially if you work long hours outside the home or travel extensively. This reduces the likelihood of someone stealing information from your mailbox. |
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| 4. Instead of tossing credit card and other solicitations directly into the garbage, tear or shred them. The best method is to use a cross-cut shredder which can be purchased for a great deal less than the cost of cleaning up the mess created by identity theft. |
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| 5. Be creative in determining passwords for your accounts. Don’t use the obvious – your birthday, spouse’s birthday, mother’s maiden name, children’s names, etc. |
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| 6. Be aware of what bills come due and when. If a bill doesn’t arrive on time, contact the company immediately to make sure someone hasn’t falsely changed your address on the account. |
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| 7. Above all, be diligent about protecting your information and monitoring your financial records carefully. Check your credit report at least annually. You can receive one free credit report per year at http://www.annualcreditreport.com. You can also purchase a credit report for a small fee at any time from each of three major consumer credit reporting companies...
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| 8. You can sign up for a credit watch service from any of the above listed companies. These services charge a fee to monitor activity related to your credit and notify you of suspicious activity. |
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| In addition to these tips, there are numerous other ways to protect your identity. Click here to go to www.identitytheft.org/protect.htm, or to www.ftc.gov/bcp/menus/consumer/data/idt.shtm to view several extensive lists of suggestions. |
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| I’m a victim – now what? |
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| First of all, don’t beat yourself up. It can happen. It does happen. And now it’s happened to you. |
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So, it’s time to take action. Here are a few ideas to help you minimize
the damage: |
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| 1. File a police report (and get a copy for yourself) right away. Although identity theft seems to be an intangible crime, filing a report lays the groundwork for an investigation. |
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| 2. Contact the three credit bureaus (listed above in item 7) and ask them to put a fraud alert on your name and social security number. Once this fraud alert is in place, any company that checks your name to authorize credit must contact you by telephone. |
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| 3. Document all contacts you make by telephone, fax, mail, e-mail, etc. A paper trail is critical to helping resolve this problem. |
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| 4. Depending on what aspects of your financial life and identity have been affected, contact the appropriate parties, which may include: banks, ATM card issuers, credit card companies, local postal inspector, phone company, Department of Motor Vehicles (in the case of driver’s license fraud), etc. |
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| 5. For more information – and to correct any problems with your Social Security number – visit www.socialsecurity.gov and search for “identity theft”. You’ll be directed to information for both the Social Security Administration and the Federal Trade Commission. On this site, you’ll have access to the FTC ID Theft Complaint Form and several publications available for download. |
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| This is a brief introduction to identity theft, prevention and recovery – for more information, please visit the cited websites and consider discussing this crime with your legal advisor. |
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| For more information... |
| This is a brief introduction to identity theft, prevention and recovery – for more information, please visit the cited websites and consider discussing this crime with your legal advisor. |
| Also, Heritage would like to suggest the following brochure from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. Click here to download the brochure. |
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| Items on this page have been saved in Adobe© Acrobat© for your convenience. It requires Version 4.0 or above. A link has been provided below if you are in need of this software. |
| Heritage Bank cannot guarantee the functionality of the software in the link below. We provide this link to you “as is,” and you agree to use it at your own risk. |
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This page is intended to provide the public with basic information about identity theft. It is not intended to be a legal interpretation of the regulations and policies of any federal, state or local government entity or that of Heritage Bank of Central Illinois. |
