Monitor your credit to avoid ID theft
With identity theft crimes continuing to rise, watching your credit report can help you make sure that no one is using your good name to do bad things.
Credit monitoring can’t actually prevent identity theft, but it can help you remedy the situation before it gets out of hand.
You typically pay a small monthly fee to your Bank or Credit Card Company for the credit monitoring service. A computer makes routine checks on your credit report to see if anything has changed. A credit monitoring service automatically notifies you by phone or e-mail every time the service detects something new on your report. This might include recent credit increase, accounts open, address changes or other new and unusual information that could be a sign of identity theft. If you know the activities are legitimate, you can simply ignore the alert. But, if you sense that something’s not right, you can take action immediately. Some credit monitoring services even guide you through the right channels to dispute the false information and clear your name.
Even if you don’t sign up for credit monitoring, make it a point to check your report on your own at least once a year at annualcreditreport.com
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