Identity Theft

I worry more and more about the possibility of Identity Theft especially with the Holidays and the current state of the economy. People are desperate for money and crime is up because of it. Identity theft is a huge problem and has been at a steady rise for quite some time. My dad is terrified of someone stealing his identity and losing everything he has worked for his whole life. He has even gone so far as to consider some sort of identify theft protection such as Lifelock. When he was on vacation, he had a little scare because he received a call from his credit union about some suspicious activity. Turns out it was just the gas and charges that he had put on the card on the way down, but it really made him think. He was happy to find out that the credit union offers some protection on his debit card, but it still doesn't offer any kind of identity protection services.

I have seen the commercials for Lifelock where the guy posts his social security number on the side of a truck but I don't know anyone personally who has it. The Lifelock reviews that I have seen are great and seem to offer a sense of security that is hard to find these days and at a $110.00 a year it is very affordable. I guess the biggest thing that it does is protect you if someone tries to open a new account using your information. This would help to protect you if someone was trying to buy a new car in your name or sign up for a new credit card but I wondered if it would help if you simply lost your wallet. The answer is yes, they have something called WalletLock where you can call and report your wallet lost or stolen and they will help you contact each of your credit card companies and banks as well as help you to recover new drivers license and social security cards.

Several of the things that they do you can do for free, but do you actually do it. Do you order your three free annual credit bureau reports? Do you set fraud alerts on your accounts through the credit bureaus? Did you even know that you can do that? One of the other awesome things that they do is ask to have your name removed from pre-approved credit card mailers and junk mail lists. Apparently this is a huge opportunity for ID thieves. Who knew? When I first bought my house, I was getting bucketloads of this crap on a daily basis. It has slowed down a lot, but I still get tons of people trying to get me to buy a new car or sign up for a new credit card.

Are you a Lifelock customer? If so, what made you join?


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