English 1021.10
April 11, 2014
Could you be a victim?
How often do you think about identity theft? Do you think about it all the time when you are on the internet? Because majority of people love shopping online, you save time, not exactly money, but who cares when it comes to the holiday times, at least you won’t have to fight for a parking spot in the hectic malls. In today’s hectic world and “lazy” world people love just sitting at home and not wanting to go out. We all are on the computer doing homework or on Facebook and ads come up to shop so we just go for the deals we see, and quite frankly we are becoming lazy in that factor, we all want the easy way out of things.
There are many types of identity theft but the main two types are financial identity theft and crime identity theft. According the IdentityTheft.info each year 15 million Americans are victims of financial theft. The total amount of money that is lost each year is close to $50 billion dollars. Stealing someone’s financial accounts are easier to access than you may think, leaving your credit card somewhere, buying things online, going to a public place and possibly having someone see what information you are putting in your computer. According to Department of Justice, criminal identity theft which is simply using another person’s identity where a person poses as another and gets a state issued ID by using stolen documents or someone else’s personal information. The criminals are often trying to hide themselves from the authorities, in most cases. When you are on your computer or out places make sure that all of your information is completely secure, and only buy things online if you absolutely have to, to prevent theft.
Identity theft can happen to anyone, and to avoid being a part of theft make sure you are reviewing your Credit report at least once a year if not more. “Most new identity-theft victims expect the police, credit grantors, the credit-reporting agencies and others in places to help them out” says Mari J. Frank a past identity theft victim. It is not everyone else’s responsibility to look after documents, and to be constantly reviewing your accounts, but it is your responsibility, if identity theft happens to you then you need to contact people in higher places to help you out. There have been 4,343,058 identity thefts to date according to IdentityTheft.info. The numbers go up so fast, by the time you got to this sentence the number went up to 4,343,092. That just goes to show how fast identity theft can happen and how often it does happen. Try not to put yourself in a situation where you may become the next number or a part of a statistic.
We have come to rely on the convenience and efficiency of doing our banking, shopping, and communication via the Internet. Shopping online, while it is fast and easy, many people come across many issues other than theft, not getting what they ordered and the hard time they having trying to get it back to where they purchased it, if it was overseas. But most of all, having the risk of having your credit card number stolen along with personal information, i.e your name, address, birthdate (“FindLaw”). While it is nice strings come attached to buying things online. Banking online is a safe thing to do if you are not doing it in a public place where many people are above to look over your shoulder and copy your information (“FindLaw”). At the end of the day going into a bank is always the best idea for making sure your banking is staying safe and confidential. Being active and not lazy when it comes to money is always the best idea.
Social security numbers are very valuable to a person’s identity. Even though you think a website is safe and your information won’t get out, there are still chances for theft. Stolen social security numbers is not something that is going away but that is starting to happen more and more (IdentityTheft.info). You are not supposed to carry your social security card in your