How to protect yourself from identity theft

Safeguarding and protecting your information in a digital age

The advent of computers, smartphones and tablets was supposed to make life easy. But think about all the apps and websites you log into that house your personal information. While the web has made everything more convenient, you have also never been more vulnerable. Hackers today can easily steal your money, your credit, your entire identity if you are not careful. This is why it is so important to safeguard and protect your information in this digital age.

The dangers of identity theft

If you think, “It could never happen to me,” think again. According to an identity fraud study conducted by the U.S. Department of Justice, “An estimated 17.6 million persons, or 7 percent of all U.S. residents age 16 or older, were victims of one or more incidents of identity theft in 2014.” It is no coincidence that this number has continued to rise each year. As technology grows, and you conduct more and more business online, you will become more and more susceptible to thieves and identity fraud.

To put identity fraud in perspective, Javelin Strategy & Research found that fraudsters have stolen $112 billion in the past six years, a loss of more than $35,500 every minute. The damage is real, and it’s expensive. Hidden by the cloak of anonymity of the Internet, thieves could easily rack up financial damages worth your entire year’s salary — in the time it takes to pop a bag of popcorn. And to make matters worse, the U.S. Department of Justice’s study also revealed, the more you make, the more they take.

How to protect your information

There are ways you can protect yourself from identity theft. Keep in mind, these thieves are looking for the easy score. They are not going to spend a lot of time trying to get your information, so the harder you make it for them to do so, the less likely it is you will become a victim of identity theft. Here are a few easy ways you can take a proactive approach to preventing identity theft.

Create strong passwords. Avoid using easy to figure out passwords, such as name of pets, birthdates and other personal based passwords someone could figure out by snooping around your Facebook account. Also, make sure you are not using any easy to guess passwords from the Worst Passwords of 2015, which you can read at bit.ly/worstpasswords2015.

Use different passwords for different sites. In the event your information does get stolen, having different passwords helps prevent thieves from gaining access to every one of the financial institutions you work with.

Don’t open suspicious email. A good rule of thumb, if you don’t know the email sender, don’t open the email. You don’t have an uncle or aunt in England that wrote you into their will. Forget the diamond investor in Africa. Don’t bother with any get-rich schemes because the only people who are going to the bank are the thieves who hit send.

Monitor your credit. There are a couple different free credit report options available — use them! This way you know immediately if someone’s attempting to purchase something big at your expense.

Renew your anti-virus. Many PCs come with antivirus protection. Make sure you renew it. If you don’t have it, get it! This is an easy way to protect yourself against malware and other software driven threats that are constantly looking to steal your identity.

Security starts with you

In this digital age, a lot of your financial information is going to live online. Don’t let that scare you. As long as you are prepared, and proactive, you should be able to safeguard your information and continue to manage your life on the web without looking over your shoulder. For more financial tips, visit American Financial Advisors today.

Leslie Kelly, CFP, AIF is the founder, president and CCO of American Financial Advisors Inc., a registered investment advisor. She has over thirty years of wealth management experience guiding the financial and life planning goals of individual clients as well as advising corporate retirement plan and non-profit fiduciaries and trustees.