Is It A Scam? Identity Theft Shield Website

There are many different identity theft shield business opportunities all over the internet today, claiming to help individuals to protect their credit from criminals who try to steal their identity. Identity theft shield websites abound, claiming services that will help to monitor all credit reporting agencies twenty-four hours per day, seven days per week. In addition, many of these identity theft shield websites claim to help individuals to fix their credit should fraudulent activity occur on their account, helping the individuals to file the paperwork and talk to the credit card companies and banks about the situation.

Unfortunately, not all of the identity theft shield websites will follow through on what they claim to do. There have been individuals who have opened valid credit card accounts but have received no notification that these accounts had been opened. Instead, they received an 'all clear' notice from the identity theft shield website claiming that there had not been any new activity on their account that month. In addition, there were other websites for identity theft shield protection that did not follow through on helping the individual with discounted legal services when fraudulent activity occurred and needed to be rectified. Instead, they gave a slight discount and left much of the work to the individual to figure out with his creditors.

What to Do

Instead of spending money on an identity theft shield website, there are plenty of things that an individual can do himself to protect his personal information. For instance, instead of throwing personal documents away, such as bills, bank statements and credit card statements, the individual should thoroughly shred them so that there is not a way for someone who is garbage diving to get their personal information and use it to open a new account or get a copy of a credit card. In addition, the individual should not ever carry his Social Security card with him in his wallet, since it is too easy for a thief to get his hands on the card and then have the opportunity to do all sorts of fraudulent activity in that person's name. The individual should also check his credit score at least once per year to see if he recognizes all of the activity on it. He should also monitor bank accounts and credit card accounts regularly to see if there is any unrecognized activity on it. That way he can catch it immediately and begin to file the paperwork necessary to catch the thief and get his money back.