Young Identity Theft Victims
Young identity theft victims between the ages of 20 and 29 were reported by the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection to account for most of the identity theft complaints in 2009 in which year more than 11 million people were reported as being identity theft victims. One general question is what about the unreported identity theft victims and a more specific question is why the young identity theft victims accounted for the majority of all identity theft victims? Let’s first talk about the young identity theft victims and why they are the most vulnerable category of all identity theft victims although I think the elderly and dead people are also highly vulnerable to identity theft. I think that young people are more vulnerable because they spend a lot more time online, are less cautious, and share more information often. As suggested by the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection, many college students share housing such as apartments and dorm rooms which might be a cause for excessive sharing of personal information. Potential young identity theft victims may leave their personal belongings unsecured for their roommates and their visitors to see or they might share personal information on the phone and online which might be overheard or disclosed while their roommates and their friends are present. Young people may also be more vulnerable to identity theft by being less cautious while surfing and using the Internet. They may not think that their credit and identity is worth anything for others to misuse and that’s where they might be wrong in their thinking process which may also lead them to not monitor their identities. Although young adult students have tight budgets, I don’t think that money is the main reason why they don’t monitor their identities. As I mentioned, their view of self identity worth and required time needed for monitoring is probably the reasons why they are less cautious and more vulnerable to identity theft. Although I think they are pretty good with computer security controls such as virus and spyware protection software. Lack of money is always the last reason why a person should not protect and monitor his or her identity because current laws allow a person to order credit reports from all three credit bureaus at www.annualcreditreport.com. Plus, properly reviewing account statements and locking personal information away when one is sharing a room with another person or being cautious about sharing personal information while other people are present don’t cost money. Another important practice to avoid becoming potential young identity theft victims is to properly discard the mail which might be delivered to a shared apartment mailbox or dorm room. All mails must be carefully reviewed and discarded to avoid potential misuse especially when some of their mails such as pre-approved credit card offers and others which may contain personal information and facilitate identity theft. Lastly, my general question has to do with unreported identity theft victims. How can we account for the unreported identity theft victims and how can we improve the reporting process in order to get a more accurate count of all identity theft victims in the future? Most people are concerned with full recovery of their fraud charges and less concerned with being a statistic. Consumers can opt out of receiving pre-approved credit card offers by calling toll-free 1-888-567-8688 or by visiting www.optoutprescreen.com. People also can reduce other junk mail by writing to Mail Preference Service, Direct Marketing Association, P.O. Box 643, Carmel, NY 10512. Return from young identity theft victims to home page. |