Take Me To Post Comment Form While Forsyth County is, thankfully, a very safe place to live, one of the crimes that continues to increase is Identity Theft.
Identity Theft is when someone, without your permission (or even your knowledge), uses your personally identifying information such as your name, Social Security number, or credit card number, to commit fraud or other crimes. Your information can be used to open checking accounts, receive medical care, even purchase real estate.

Below are 10 tips to prevent becoming a victim of Identity Theft.

1. Guard that Social Security Number!
•It is the key to your credit report and banking accounts and the prime target of criminals.


2. Monitor your Credit Report.
•Credit reports can alert you to activity in your financial records.
•You can join a monitoring service that will notify you whenever someone applies for credit in your name, or "freeze" your credit so that it may not be checked until you choose for it to be.

3. Buy a shredder and use it.
Shred and dispose of all documents bearing your address, social security number, account numbers, etc.

4. Remove your name from marketing lists.
•Equifax, Experian, and Trans Union all maintain marketing lists that may contain your information.
•Contact these agencies to remove your name from the marketing list.

5. Watch what you carry in your wallet.
•Do not keep your Social Security card in your wallet.
•Do not carry more cards or information than you need to.

6. Keep duplicate records.
•Photocopy the contents of your wallet (credit cards, drivers license, etc. front and back) so you will have the account numbers if they are stolen.

7. Mail payments from a safe location.
•Do not mail bill payments from your home, they can be stolen from the mailbox and washed clean in chemicals and rewritten.
•Mail bills from the Post Office or a USPS "blue box".


8. Monitor your social Security activity.
•Order your Social Security Earnings and Benefits Statement once a year to check for fraud.

9. Monitor your credit card activity.
•Carefully examine your credit card statement for fraudulent charges before paying the bill.
•If you do not use the credit card cancel it.

10. Know to whom you are talking on the telephone or internet.
•Never give your credit card or personal information over
the phone unless you have initiated the call and trust the business.