Identity Theft protection is a hot topic in today’s world. Here are a few tips to help protect yourself and your identity.

1. Keep your personal information secure at home and in the workplace. Best practice is to shred documents that contain personal information before disposal.
2. Protect your computer with firewalls and antivirus software. Check out www.onguardonline.gov for tips on Internet fraud prevention.
3. Create strong passwords. This is no fun for anyone due to the need for so many passwords these days. So best practice is that you do not store your passwords on a shared computer.
4. Set online account setting to send a text or email to alert you if an attempt is made to log in to your account from an unrecognized computer or change a password.
5. When processing a financial transaction online check the beginning of the web address for “https” (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure). An “https” address versus just an “http” address verifies the website and means that nearly all information is encrypted between the website and the user.
6. Check your credit reports annually. A free annual credit reports is available from each of the three major credit reporting agencies from a jointly operated site at AnnualCreditReport.com. A fourth agency, Innovis, also offers a free report every 12 months.

Madison Poe