Prevent Identity Theft.

Why Identity Theft Prevention is not a logical notion.

In order to prevent identity theft, we must satisfy two requirements. First, we must prevent our personal information from being available to an idthief and secondly, we have to somehow stop the id thief from stealing it. It should be quite clear that those two things are totally out of our control. The end result is: no one can really prevent identity theft.

There are some steps we may take however, that can limit the opportunities a thief is presented with. Throughout our website we have covered many tips and tactics that we have found useful in our fight against identity theft. Navigate our menu to the right for more information.

Here are a few more tips to add to those already covered.

• Identity Theft in schools and on the road. A child's personal information should only be supplied once to the school's administration, at which time they should be given an identification card that does not have their social security number. You may have to take steps to ensure that the school understands the importance of this.
  
  
• Make sure that the physician is taking proper precautions with your children and your personal information.
  
  
• Only carry Social Security Cards and Health Insurance cards with you on the days they are needed.
  
  
• Identity Theft at home. Immediately place a lock on your mailbox. Ideally, a monthly post office box would be a wise investment if you spend a great amount of time away from home.
  
  
• Treat your driver’s license number and SSN as you would treat currency. You don't go around giving your money out to everyone who asks for it do you?
  
  
• Children are notorious for giving out personal information over the telephone. Start training them early as to the dangers of identity theft and how scammers use the telephone to prey on children just like themselves. You may be surprised how even young children become tuned in to the task of preventing identity theft.
  
  
• Prevent Identity Theft on the job. A business should only collect they information they need. Never provide a credit card as identification when making payments by check. Have an alternative form of id.
  
  
• Encrypt all sensitive information that may be view by others, including employees and vendors. Use password protection on files and change your password once a week for safe measure.
  
  
• Ensure your employer has a secure location for employee and other business contacts records. If they don't, urge them to do so ASAP. Employers can be held liable for losing employees personal information.
  

“There is a wide divide between The States and Federal Law Enforcement Agencies in regards to ID Theft. You can forget about them being on the same page, they are not even in the same book.”

Is the Federal Government doing enough to Prevent Identity Theft?

This type of question is too broad based. Logic dictates that the word 'enough' will have various meaning for various people and therefore renders the question without merit. A more accurate question to ask would be, "According to the numbers reported, is the Federal Government winning in its fight to prevent identity theft"?

Based on this second question, we would have to say no.

Here are our reasons why. Every year, more and more people are falling victim to this faceless crime. The increase is almost exponential. There is no corresponding exponential growth in the number of people they are prosecuting as identity thieves.

The States and Federal Law Enforcement Agencies are not even close to being on the same page when it comes to the crime of identity theft. There is no standardized process on how to take a report, who to submit it to and how to take action o the report. Instead, they end up passing the buck to other agencies, sometimes even directing the victims to go to other agencies, since it was out of their "jurisdiction".

And finally, we propose that since the banking industry has not really done anything of significance to prevent identity theft, then we have an uphill battle ahead of us. The credit bureaus are still allowed to sell personal information on the internet at will as we discussed in another section of our website. This has to signal that the Federal Government is not advancing in their identity theft prevention campaign.

So, if we cannot prevent identity theft, what can we do about it?