Credit identity theft can be done in either be through a credit card or a credit line or account. An identity thief may fake your card, or use your account number at a merchant websites and make purchases using your account. Or they can use your online credit to make fraudulent purchases. With this much possibility, credit identity theft even through the years rank at the top of identity thefts. In 2006 alone 8.9 million Americans fall victim to identity theft, majority of which are credit identity thefts. It is necessary to take steps to prevent identity theft and protect oneself from the hassle of fixing the problem.

How to Prevent Identity Theft – Your Top 3 Defense

1.  Keep your wallet safe. Put it in your bag or purse, where it is least likely to be stolen. Note that stealing wallets is the number one method where credit identity theft takes place.

2. Never leave your credit card statements just lying around. All someone has to do is fill out an address change form and send it to your credit card company or call them for an address change for your statements and then your credit identity is stolen.

3. Another way for your credit identity to be stolen is at an unsecure website. To prevent identity theft check for the yellow padlock at the bottom of your screen, this shows that the website is secured. If you don’t see it, it’s better not to type in your account number.

There are other options of course, money order, a checking account, a debit card and an online credit line but of course these pose their own problems as well and as such they too are open to identity theft.

A few of the problems might happen with these methods: money order may be inconvenient to get and it can get stolen in the mail as well, facing just another form of thievery. A checking account may mean more dire credit identity theft consequences, like having your entire account emptied in seconds as well as a debit card where all the money in the card can be taken at once. An online credit line may pose you with a large debt before any signs of trouble.

Of course, you can pay by cash for all your transactions, it is the ultimate protection to prevent identity theft using your cards but in this day and age, it is very hard to stay away from e-commerce, it is makes much more sense to transact many business online.

It is sad to realize that many Americans only think of identity theft protection when it’s too late.  We install firewalls and update our anti-virus software only after we have been infected by malwares and our browser hijack by these malwares. Or monitor our credit transactions only after we lost a significant amount of money thru identity theft and spent hundreds of dollars to fix our damaged credit reputation, do we finally acknowledge the need for identity protection.

If you’re one of the few diligent enough to be alarmed by the stories you hear on the news or alarmed by the number of spam you receive on your e-mail daily, then now is the time to act. Here are a few things you can do to avoid being victimized by identity theft.

Offline, the best you can do is to ensure that all your personal data are secure and that it is not easily accessible by just anybody, this includes carrying only the ID you need, so in cases that you’re wallet or purse gets stolen you will not lose any vital ID and make sure that you store it in a secure area in your house.

Also, any old bills, paper, envelope or any other document that may contain any personal information is not just lying around, if you don’t need it anymore, you should just shred it and throw it out, in separate bins if possible. Any old ID should be disposed of properly too, expired ID’s should be torn into several pieces and thrown in separate bins

Online, there are a couple of ways your identity. You can start by updating your anti-virus and anti-malware, also make sure that your firewall is turned on, this will help protect your pc from harmful malwares like browser hijack who takes control of your browser making it unusable for you.

Another way to keep your identity protected is to avoid being a victim of phishing scams, never open emails that you cannot authenticate, or email attachments that you’re not expecting, ask your friends to give you a heads up if and when they will send an email with attachment, this will help avoid downloading files that may contain malwares like browser hijack that will take over your browser and bring you to websites you do not wish to go to. Same goes for instant messages that asks you to click a link, no matter how enticing the offer maybe, do not click the link, you may inadvertently download the browser hijack software

Lastly, exercise your right to privacy, in any transaction, you don’t have to provide your personal details unless absolutely necessary, you can also determine if a certain company sends out periodical promotional announcements and/or phone calls, if they do, you can tell them not to inform you, this helps minimize unwanted messages in your e-mail and helps you determine which ones will fool you into downloading malwares like browser hijack and you can learn to avoid these messages and send them directly to the trash.