Falling Victim to Identity Theft

How to Recover After Identity Theft

While there have been extreme measures taken to ensure that the general public is knowledgeable about how to protect against becoming a victim to identity theft. There is no way to completely stop the crime from being committed. Unfortunately, there are a multitude of ways for a person to commit the crime of identity theft with new ways being formed all of the time. A few years back, impersonation and unauthorized use of financial facilities were the two most used ways of stealing an individual’s identity. Use of false information to apply for credit facilities, unauthorized use of telephone cards or IP addresses for illegal transactions and tax fraud are the more becoming ways of identity theft.

If you keep track of your activities either by checkbook or jotting it down on a pad and check your accounts on a regular basis, you will more than likely be able to know or suspect when you have fallen victim to identity theft. What people need to remember is that there is life after an identity theft incident.

Place a Fraud Alert for Your Credit Reports

When you send out an alert to creditors and lenders, you are holding them personally liable for verifying your identity. By notifying one of the credit bureaus of your need for a fraud alert, the request then gets forwarded to all other bureaus. Another approach to having this step done is to freeze your securities to all other creditors apart from those that you have dealt with before. One of the best weapons against identity theft is being what we like to call being “in the know” and having a fraud alert set up is one way to definitely achieve that.

Contact Any Directly Affected Institution

To be ready for this step of action, you need to be knowledgeable of what exactly you have in your wallet and the contact information for those credits or financial institutions. For instance, if your debit card has been stolen, you need to have the contact number for your financial institution so that you can call them immediately and have them block any attempts to access our funds. You should however refrain from jotting down the account number or any other personal information because it makes it easy for fraudsters to create fake identification documents.

Record a Statement with the Police

Before you move forward with the process of recovering any money lost, institutions involved will require you to get a police report documenting the theft. You will then need to have this report used in conjunction with an Identity Theft Affidavit which you will need to obtain from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

In extreme cases of identity theft, some people have had their postal addresses changed. If you suspect that your case has gone down the deep end and this step needs to be taken. Then you will need to contact the Postal Inspection Service and they will help to clear any doubts and restore your identity fully.