Identity Theft Prevention Tips from a Convicted Felon
September 26, 2011I’d never really thought about living in an unethical country before, until I heard Frank Abagnale speak. Frank is the subject of the film “Catch Me if You Can,” who went from being the FBI’s most wanted forger, stealing millions of dollars and flying all over the world posing as a Pan Am Pilot, to a well respected 35 year veteran FBI agent, and expert on forgery, embezzlement and secure documents. He declared, “We live in an unethical country” during the keynote address at the Financial Planning Association’s annual conference in San Diego last week.
I don’t know which countries are ethical or not, but Mr. Abagnale does have a point. When you can watch the Liberty Mutual commercial where a businessman wipes up a spill in a break room which somehow prompts a woman observing this to hold a door for a blind person, which then compels another onlooker to “do the right thing” and pull someone out of harm’s way, AND see this as unusual behavior, then we do live in an unethical country. The commercial is popular because the behavior seems out of the ordinary in our society. Of course, all of us know many people who will wipe up a spill whether it’s theirs or not, and many more who would hold the door for anyone, not just the sight impaired.
That said, there are plenty of rotten, a-moral people who are out to do harm to others for their own selfish personal gain. We’ve all seen it. I remember being in Chicago’s Lincoln Park district to give a financial planning workshop, and I saw a thief rip a cup out of the hand of a beggar sitting on the corner of a building. What was remarkable to me was how violently he pulled the cup from the lady’s hand and the shocked and angry look on the woman’s face afterwards. There was nothing she could do, she couldn’t jump up fast enough to chase him since he rounded the corner and was gone in an instant.
White collar crime is just as violent when you find credit cards opened in your name and discovering someone attempted to access your information at one of the credit bureaus. The shiver of fear runs down your spine in both of these instances. The look of shock on our face and the feeling of anger is the same as if the thief stole your money right out of your hands. We need to protect ourselves from people like this.
We can’t prevent every single harm from happening to us but we can take precautions. In his talk, Frank gave four tips to prevent identity theft and document fraud. Here they are:
- Use a micro cut shredder. This type of shredder makes the paper into confetti. He said the FBI can reconstruct the documents from the other types of shredders within 24 – 72 hours. If the FBI can do it, a thief can do it. He suggested getting this specific kind of shredder and shredding anything with your account information on it.
- Don’t use checks. Many people don’t use checks anymore except to pay a mortgage payment or phone bill, but Frank reminded us that he won’t use checks at local businesses because of the chain of custody. Who knows what happens to the check once it is scanned! Your name, address, account number and routing number are all on the check. Sometimes your phone number is there also. Imagine what a thief could do with all of that – they’d have a field day.
- Don’t use a debit card. The debit card exposes you to immediate liability since the funds are directly taken from your bank account. As with a credit card, any unauthorized charges can be disputed of course, but with the debit card, the funds have already been removed from your account, so you then need to be reimbursed. Frank said, “The debit card is the worst financial tool ever designed.” He likes using a credit card for transactions and then paying them off each month. This way if a thief gets your credit card information and charges a new HD TV (or whatever the item is), you can dispute the charges with your bank and none of your own funds were ever involved.
- Use a credit monitoring service. Find a service that monitors all three credit bureaus and gives you real time updates. It doesn’t help to get an email at the end of the month that your information has been compromised; you want to know right away. Someone watching your information and notifying you right away can make a world of difference if your data is compromised because the sooner you thwart the thief, the less damage they can do.
There are, of course, plenty of caring people in our wonderful country. I saw an example just today when I was out for a bike ride to explore a new area full of mountain bike trails – many too advanced for me and my husband. New to the area, we had our “trail map” out looking for the trail head for the double track trail (instead of the single track with a bunch of tight switch backs). A couple of more experienced riders saw us as they were riding past and actually turned around and asked if we needed help. They gave us some directions along with some great tips and we ended up having an incredible ride – mainly due to their kindness. These “good Samaritans” aren’t the people we have to worry about. They are the kind of people we are grateful for and the kind of people we strive to be ourselves. We just have to remember that other type of people are out there and they are working to do harm.
Here are some additional resources on credit and preventing identity theft: