When Does Identity Theft Occur and How to Protect Yourself

Identity thefts occur when someone collects your personal information to gain some financial advantage, often leaving them with significant debt, bad credit history, and even legal consequences according to criminal lawyers in toronto. Fraudsters are getting trickier and using all sorts of personal information to present themselves to you and get your finances: address, date of birth, PIN, utility bills, credit card receipts, account statements and other documents containing personal information. Jeff Hershberg Toronto will give you some tips on how to protect yourself. 

• How is this information obtained?

Criminals search through your inboxes; they look carefully at your hands when using an ATM; monitor social networks; they hack emails or other online accounts, even occasionally digging through buckets to obtain personal information from incorrectly discarded documents. That is why it is important that you have a hired one of the best criminal lawyers in toronto.

And if they get to a PC, they can extract so much information in minutes that it can cause huge financial damage to its owner. And the worst part is that, by statistics, almost half of identity thefts are committed by people the victim knows.

• How to protect yourself from identity theft?

There is no 100% protection, but at least you can take steps to prevent such a crime such as reporting it to toronto criminal defense lawyer and always be alert when handling cash, making payments or other bank transactions with a card on site or online.

• Use online banking

One of the best ways to protect your financial documents (receipts, receipts, payment orders, etc.) from falling into the wrong hands is by not using paper, is banking entirely online and reporting it to a toronto defence lawyer. However, before entering your data into the platform, carefully review your browser's certificate. It is sure that when you type the address you see https: // - s is an abbreviation of "secure".

To further protect your personal information, you may ask the financial institutions you use to send you any statements regarding your accounts and cards online. And also activate services like 3d security code and SMS notifications for any type of transactions on your accounts.

• Keeps track of your loans, deposits and current accounts

In the event that a regular statement is delayed or does not arrive, call to find out if there is cause for concern.

Remember how much money you have in your accounts and in the case of a suspicious transaction to or from your account, immediately notify the relevant financial institution and your toronto criminal defense lawyer. There is a possibility that someone will misuse your data.

• Use a shredder

All documents that contain financial information or your personal information must go through a shredder before they fall into the bin. Do not facilitate the access of criminals to personal information.

• Report missing documents immediately

No matter if it is an identity document (ID card, driver's license) or a debit / credit card, if you cannot find it and suspect that it has been stolen or lost, immediately notify the relevant institutions.

Put these tips into use now and reduce the risk of becoming a victim of identity theft.

Find our information on Google and Yelp.