How to Protect Your Credit From Fraud
Protect yourself from credit fraud in several ways, including by checking your credit report regularly. Your credit report will reveal if accounts are being opened in your name without your permission, or if someone attempted to open an account. The attempt would result in an unauthorized credit inquiry on your report, prompting you to report possible identity theft. You also should carefully guard your personal information.
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Instructions
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Keep sensitive personal information secure and private. Do not post your full date of birth, address or other revealing information on social networking websites. Crooks use the Internet to steal personal information and open fraudulent credit accounts. Also avoid storing your Social Security card in your wallet alongside your driver's license. Sometimes that's enough information for a crook to open a fraudulent account.
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Watch your credit card carefully when a clerk handles it during a transaction. Ask questions if the clerk appears to swipe your card twice using two different card readers. One of the readers could be be used to copy your credit card information. The machines, called skimmers, can grab your data, allowing fraudsters to later create counterfeit cards based on your account.
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Store credit cards in safe places. Never leave them lying around the house. A maintenance person or some other visitor could take take the cards. Keep the cards in a home safe, if possible. Or place cards you use infrequently in a safe deposit box at your bank.
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Report suspicious emails or phone calls to your bank or credit card company. Your bank or card company will never call you or email you asking for your account information. Never give out such information unless you initiate the conversation by calling your bank or credit card company. Reporting suspicious emails or phone calls could alert your bank or credit card company to a scam and prompt them to alert others.
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Order the post office to hold your mail if you will be away from home traveling. Some crooks will steal your personal information and then open accounts with the cards being delivered to your home address. They then hope to steal the cards from your mailbox while you are away.
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Tips & Warnings
Check your credit report for free at the website Annual Credit Report. The site offers free credit reports as required by the Fair Credit Reporting Act. You are entitled to three free reports every 12 months, including one from each of the nationwide credit bureaus--TransUnion, Equifax and Experian. By requesting one credit report every quarter you can check your credit year-round for free.
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Resources
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