My brother's identity was stolen a few years ago. In less than a week, four different $300 charges materialized on his credit and his bank didn't make it easy for him to drop those items from his account. This time around wasn't too problematic, because the bank finally sided with my brother, cancelled the extra charges and gave him new numbers for his account.
The scary thing is that, even months later, there was still someone out there claiming to be my brother, and they even had his financial and personal information -- enough to get into serious trouble.
Thankfully, my brother was able to get beyond those problems, even though his credit still gets bothered by fraudulent charges every now and then. Luck was with him.
Losing your identity is one of the scariest things about being an interconnected, Internet based society. It's awful to lose piles of money and end up spending hours of frustrating phone calls trying to halt payment on inane purchases you never even bought. Businesses have stepped up to help protect the frightened people, and they are taking advantage of the fear to score serious cash. For a fee, you too can join in on the madness.
No Ability To Track Effectiveness
Protection against identity theft is not customer friendly; there is no possible way for customers to see how effective these service providers really are, or if they are improving computer security at all.
Most companies center their efforts around checking your credit score regularly so no charges can slip past you without you being aware of its presence. There's nothing complicated about reading your credit report -- you could do it too, for much cheaper, I might add. So, not counting this, what exactly do these businesses do?
There is no good answer to this question, which bothers every consumer who dares to pay these businesses money for theoretical security. Since there are no methods to tracking their actions, you have to accept everything they tell you as fact. The only way to measure their success is to consider if your identity has been stolen since you began working with them. If not, then it stands to reason that the new security must have paid off, right?
No. There are no guarantees.
Zero Features For Lots Of Money
The price of protection against identity theft can vary greatly with the number of features each program claims to offer. Not one company out there right now discloses exactly what features and services they provide in an explicit manner, which ones are premium and what comes in the package. Almost everything these companies will do for you, you can do for yourself.
Identity theft is certainly scary, and protection is important, but doing racking up bills through a third party company doesn't equate to safety and security. - 31381
The scary thing is that, even months later, there was still someone out there claiming to be my brother, and they even had his financial and personal information -- enough to get into serious trouble.
Thankfully, my brother was able to get beyond those problems, even though his credit still gets bothered by fraudulent charges every now and then. Luck was with him.
Losing your identity is one of the scariest things about being an interconnected, Internet based society. It's awful to lose piles of money and end up spending hours of frustrating phone calls trying to halt payment on inane purchases you never even bought. Businesses have stepped up to help protect the frightened people, and they are taking advantage of the fear to score serious cash. For a fee, you too can join in on the madness.
No Ability To Track Effectiveness
Protection against identity theft is not customer friendly; there is no possible way for customers to see how effective these service providers really are, or if they are improving computer security at all.
Most companies center their efforts around checking your credit score regularly so no charges can slip past you without you being aware of its presence. There's nothing complicated about reading your credit report -- you could do it too, for much cheaper, I might add. So, not counting this, what exactly do these businesses do?
There is no good answer to this question, which bothers every consumer who dares to pay these businesses money for theoretical security. Since there are no methods to tracking their actions, you have to accept everything they tell you as fact. The only way to measure their success is to consider if your identity has been stolen since you began working with them. If not, then it stands to reason that the new security must have paid off, right?
No. There are no guarantees.
Zero Features For Lots Of Money
The price of protection against identity theft can vary greatly with the number of features each program claims to offer. Not one company out there right now discloses exactly what features and services they provide in an explicit manner, which ones are premium and what comes in the package. Almost everything these companies will do for you, you can do for yourself.
Identity theft is certainly scary, and protection is important, but doing racking up bills through a third party company doesn't equate to safety and security. - 31381
About the Author:
Preventing identity fraud needs to be addressed seriously. If you want to stop worrying about it, learn more about how you can maximize your protection against identity theftand which services you can buy to assist you. Make sure to get all of your advise from reputable sources to be sure you get the honest truth.
