Fraudelent Acts

Your identity can take two hard hits 1) identity theft or 2) identity fraud. Identity theft is the stealing of your information. Identity fraud is the use of your information to commit fraud. Usually to recover from this takes some time and money. About 12 million Americans experience some kind of identity fraud every year. The average time is 21 hours, the average cost was around $400 in 2009 decreasing to $100 in 2012. To handle the situation it would usually take several calls to several different companies. But the FDIC has made effort to shorten the amount of phone calls you make, in order to straighten things out. Identity theft and fraud can range from:

Financial

Criminal

Identity Cloning

Synthetic

Medical

Ghosting

I know you're probably wondering how do these people get the information to commit theft or fraud? Its usually due to the carelessness of how an individual protect their information. Identity thieves' common sources are trash, computers, internet, social medias and emails.

 

 

 

The simple information you offer on your profile can be the last information they need in order to commit fraud. Information like your DOB, address, phone number, email and maiden name might not seems as it needs to be as top as your Social Security but they are just as important.

Some of their tactics are to trick you into giving up your information through messages. This is called phishing, of course you would've just give your information to anyone so they act as a legitimate source that you may offer information to. The sources they prudently portray as, can vary from banks, retail outlets, even Google. Another attempt is through pharming, so for instance, when you click an add and a fake website pops up. As college students we are prime targets due to our irresponsibility levels and credit-seeking.

In all protect your information, if your throwing it out, shred it, if you have it all in one place, find a secure place to store it other than your computer and monitor who you give out your information to.