Identity Theft

Chapter 5 discusses the topic of Identity Theft. Print and electronic media are full of stories about potential security risks that can arise from your personal computer. It is important to keep in mind, however, that there are also many ways that your identity can be stolen other than from your computer. The U.S. federal government provides many resources to help protect citizens from identity thieves.

Go to https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/topics/identity-theft and complete the following:

1. Review the information pertaining to Identity Theft on this webpage for these 3 categories: Protecting Your Identity, Discovering Identity Theft, and Identity Theft – Specific Issues.

2. Post at least one useful tip that you found from any of these 3 categories on this Identity Theft website. The tip can relate to identity theft or any other information that you found of interest on this website. Your initial post should be a minimum of 250 words.

ANSWER

Identity Theft

The FTC website presents numerous insightful information. For instance, identity theft occurs when a person illegally acquires your personal information and uses your identity to commit a crime without your permission. A person may steal your personal information such as social security numbers, credit cards, and medical insurance account numbers to acquire services on your behalf without your knowledge. Identity theft can be discovered through the following ways; by reviewing your bills and going through them, and if there are new or additional bills in any case, it’s evident that someone else used your credit cards (FTC, 2022). One should review his credit reports to keep track of his accounts and detect any new accounts that he does not recognize. Tracking the bills you owe and when they are due will help identify identity theft. If you do not receive some bills, that is a sign that someone else accessed your account and changed your billing address. Identity theft can be identified by checking your bank account statements to detect any withdrawals you did not make, which can be a sign of identity theft (DiNapoli, 2022).

Identity theft can be avoided by protecting documents that have personal information like financial records, medical health records, credit cards, and social security numbers. Protecting your information online either by using strong passwords, passcodes, or multi-factor authentication makes it difficult for scammers to log into your accounts. Social security number is very important; thus one should avoid giving them out freely to people. From the identity theft website, I have learned that the following services are offered in case of identity theft, monitoring services track one’s accounts and alert the owner of the accounts of any activities done in the account. Identity monitoring services check databases that collect personal information to check if the information is correct and if that is you. In contrast, identity theft insurance covers the losses one experiences after identity theft, such as wages lost. From the website, identity theft is an offense and should be discouraged. These identity theft cases should also be reported to the federal trade commission at identity theft government (FTC, 2022).

References

DiNapoli, T. P. (2022). The Increasing Threat of Identity Theft. 28.

FTC. (2022). Identity Theft. Federal Trade Commission: Consumer Information. https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/topics/identity-theft