Identity Thieves Dont Take A Holiday

Denver, CO December 7, 2010

Holiday madness, crazed shoppers and packed malls. While shoppers are bustling from store to store and internet site to site trying to complete holiday to-do lists, thieves and scammers are taking advantage of consumer distraction to strike. According to the author of Privacy Means Profit and identity theft expert John Sileo, "This is the easiest time of year for thieves to steal wallets, break into houses and profit financially from the season of giving without victims detecting it for a long time."

With just three weeks until Christmas, now is the time to protect identity from potential thieves. Just last month, Sileo was hired to speak to the Department of Defense and included some of the most important Holiday Safety Prevention Tips:

Don’t trust emails. There are so many holiday scams by email that consumers should read everything with an enormous grain of salt. If someone is promising something for nothing (free gift, free money, etc.), don’t buy it.

Protect the home. The greatest risk during the busy-ness is all of the extra people that circulate through the home during the holiday season. It makes it very easy to pocket a check book that’s on a desk or a brokerage or social security statement in a filing cabinet. Especially during the holidays, lock it up!

Use a credit card. Don’t use checks and don’t use a debit card, as they don&39;t give nearly as much protection.

Carry less. It is too easy to steal a purse that is sitting underneath a table at a restaurant during lunch. The very best advice is to only take a drivers license and one or two credit cards while shopping.

Watch bank statements. Most forms of holiday identity theft can be caught simply by monitoring checking, debit and credit card accounts frequently. Even better, sign up for automatic account alerts to send a notification when any transaction occurs..

Give the gift of Identity Monitoring, like http://www.CSIdentity.com so that trouble is easily detected early on.

Shop on secure websites. Make sure that both the https:// and lock symbols appear in the browser.

Be cautious in public. Don’t give out credit card numbers over the phone if someone is within earshot. Shield PIN numbers when entering at an ATM or card swipe.

Donate to known charities and only when initiating the gift. Don&39;t respond to phone calls for charity.

Rotate credit cards. After the busy holiday shopping season is over, call the credit card company and ask them to issue a new card - all old cards will be quickly outdated and useless.

Don&39;t advertise travel plans to burglars on Social Networking sites.

Distraction is the worst enemy when it comes to crime and the holidays. In addition to spending more money, consumers tend to be busier, more stressed-out and less careful than other times of the year. Identity thieves take advantage of this distraction to perform information extraction.

Identity theft expert John Sileo speaks around the world on identity theft, privacy, social networking exposure, cyber crime, social engineering and other forms of information theft. Sileo&39;s clients include the Department of Defense, Blue Cross, FDIC, Pfizer and hundreds of organizations of all sizes. Contact John directly on 800.258.8076 or at http://www.ThinkLikeASpy.com.