Identity Theft in the US
by David Tanguay
Have you fell victim to identity theft? If you have you�re not alone as identity theft is now the number one crime in the U.S. There is an array of different forms of identity theft, but internet identity theft is by far the biggest problem. With hundreds of thousands of credit card transactions going through the internet on a daily basis and hackers becoming increasingly knowledgeable, it is getting to the point where it is risky to shop online.
There are several ways you can go about preventing identity theft to make sure you don�t add to an already astounding stat. One of the biggest ways people give in to identity theft is by submitting personal information through scam emails. You probably have seen them and have maybe even fell for them, but thousands of scam emails claiming to be from the IRS, banks and Paypal are circulated throughout the internet every day.
Inside these emails, they want you to submit personal information such as a credit card number or your social security number. The purpose of the email is to get you to submit your information to renew your account or check your bank status. All they are doing is trying to get your personal information and use it against you, thus identity theft.
As hard as it is to believe, it is possible for you to make purchases without truly making them. It is vital that you check your credit card statements every month and look for any unidentifiable purchases. If you make any purchases online, there is the potential for your credit card number to be hacked and for the hacker to go on a shopping spree.
Identity theft is a scary crime because it is possible for you to be a victim of it without even realizing it for several months. By that time it may be too hard to find the person. Although you are not held responsible for any of the unauthorized charges, it is a major pain to work everything out. You have to work out your credit report, replace your credit cards and even potentially close and open a new bank account.
Identity theft is just as bad of an inconvenience for the credit card companies as it is for you. Every year credit cards experience losses of 50 billion dollars a year. In an attempt to solve this, many credit card companies are coming out with new software that can better detect identity theft and internet identity theft. Some software now checks for unusual purchases, such as large expenditures in a short amount of time.
While there are various ways you can fall victim to identity theft, internet identity theft has become increasingly troubling over the past few years. With a rise into the number one crime in the U.S., it is vital that you are careful when purchasing or submitting any personal information because you never know if you may be the next victim of identity theft.
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