Well, that might be a bit dramatic. I did just get a call from a very official sounding guy (I picture him in a suit a la Men in Black) with the office of the Inspector General, a branch of the USPS. He informed me that one of our credit cards (the one we use for our gas) had been intercepted during a criminal investigation! Yikes! So, it goes without saying that I checked our account online to see if there was any fraudulent activity. I have to confess here that I was sort of hoping that there was some fraud involved since our last statement was over $2,500 (yes, we do spend that much on gas) and so if some of that was not authorized...we would get some money back! But, no, the card had not actually been used...just stolen. What's the point of that?
Anyway, that prompted me to think about identity theft. We all hear the fear appeals made in those credit monitoring and related commercials about the perils of identity fraud. And, I have always been sort of curious and interested in getting my credit monitored since I tend to walk on the high anxiety side of life (right, Keith?) but this phone call from the office of the Inspector General pushed me over the edge. I signed us up for LifeLock. I am not sure that their fee is worth what they do but I do know that just signing up for this service made rest a little easier and that is worth it.
So, that begs the question...have any of you ever had your identity/credit card/other info stolen? What do you do to ensure this doesn't happen to you?
Friday, July 25, 2008
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I had my CC number stolen, likely while I was out of the country, last year. I got a call a few months after my trip from the credit card company saying that there were some interesting charges on my account and had I been out of the country in the last week? I assured them I definitely had not been! So they mailed me a piece of paper to sign stating the charges were fraudulent and that was that. I think I may have even gotten a $50 sorry-that-happened-giftcard...
I was pretty impressed that they delt with it so quickly and efficiently (I check my account online a few times a week and they were on top of it before I had seen anything out of the ordinary.) So now if I think there's any risk I just use that card. :-)
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