Tips to Help Prevent Identity Theft

Remember the tightwad tourist whose baggy shorts, frequent complaining and shouted questions about why none of the locals spoke any English made the ugly American the world’s Visitor From Hell? Well, it’s time for Archie Bunker to move over and make way for Petulant Pierre. According to a recent international survey, the French are now considered the most obnoxious tourists from European nations, and behind only Indians and the last-place Chinese as the worst among all countries worldwide. And it’s not only the rest of the world that have a gripe with the Gallic attitude: the French also finished second to last among nations ranking the popularity of their own tourists who vacation at home.

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How to Protect Yourself

A little bit of caution goes a long way in protecting yourself against identity theft, and it goes beyond the basics. Most people are aware of the common tips such as not giving out your Social Security number to unknown parties, not leaving credit card receipts behind, and to avoid clicking on phishing email links, but that isn’t enough. Here are ten important tips to help you protect yourself from identity theft:

Shred your documents. Consider the weekly mail that you receive. How many items have important information on them? It may be in the form of credit card offers, bank statements, investment statements, or even drivers license renewals. All of these things can expose you to identity theft. Invest a few dollars on a document shredder and make sure that you shred all of your mail and discarded documents.

Pay attention to the mail. Not only should you shred your mail once you’ve read it, but you should also be aware of what time of the month your bills arrive. If you know when to expect a bill and realize that it is a week late, there is cause for concern. If you know what to expect and when, you can spot a problem early on.

Consider a post office box. If a post office location is convenient for you, it may be worthwhile to sign up for a P.O. Box. This prevents identity thieves from being able to drive down your street and reach into mailboxes to snag mail with personal information.

Opt out of credit card offers. Call 1-888-5-OPTOUT (1-888-567-8688) to learn more about opting out of pre-approved credit offers that clog your mailbox. You can also opt out by visiting the Opt Out Prescreen website. Stopping the mail from ever reaching your mailbox is a great preventative measure.

Take care when creating passwords. With more and more people turning to the internet for financial services, having a good personal password policy is a must. This means creating passwords that would be impossible for someone to guess. Don’t use something like your birth date, last name, dog’s name, and so on. Create a strong password that is hard to crack. Generally you want to use at least 8 characters with a combination of numbers and both capital and lowercase letters.

Create multiple passwords and change them regularly. Creating a strong password isn’t enough. If you use the same password for everything, if you make one careless mistake and someone gets a hold of it, all of your accounts are at risk. Have a few different passwords for different sites, and change them regularly.

Monitor your credit report. Thanks to Annual Credit Report, you are entitled to a free copy of your credit report from each of the three reporting agencies every year. Take advantage of this, and make sure that you take the time to check your reports. Look for anything that might be unusual, and make sure that all of your known lines of credit are being reported properly. Not only is this good to spot fraudulent activity, but honest mistakes can and do happen, and the sooner you catch them, the more likely you’ll be to have them resolved.

Review your bank and credit card fraud policies. Not all banks and credit cards are created equal, and some may have better fraud policies than others. Do they have something in place that will automatically detect potential fraudulent activity, or is it up to you to find and report a problem? How much are you liable for in the event there is fraudulent activity on your account? If you know what to expect before anything happens, you won’t be in for a nasty surprise after the fact.

Be aware of online phishing scams. Not only are you bombarded by regular mail, but your e-mail inbox is constantly being filled with messages from legitimate senders and scammers alike. Unfortunately, the fraudsters have gotten pretty good at tricking people into thinking an email is legitimate when it really isn’t. The most common example is when you receive an email that looks like it is from your bank or other online service you use and they request you click a link to update some information on your account. Never follow those links, and when in doubt, go to the website directly and login there as you normally would.

Only keep the essentials in your wallet or purse. One of the biggest mistakes people make is carrying more sensitive information than need in their wallet or purse than needed. Never, ever, carry your social security card with you. If you happen to misplace your belongings and someone picks them up and has that number with your name and/or address, you are in big trouble. This goes for other items that you don’t need on a daily basis. For example, if you know you won’t be writing any checks, don’t carry the checkbook.

Eating more fruit today may help prevent osteoarthritis of the knee tomorrow. In a recent study that tracked the eating habits of 293 women and men for ten years, those with higher fruit intake were less likely to develop two types of bone abnormalities that can lead to arthritis in knee joints. Researchers credit vitamin C with the improvement. Vitamin C has a direct effect on bone cells, which produce the components and collagen important to bone and joint strength. Other antioxidants, like those found in dark green vegetables, also showed favorable influence, but vitamin C from fruit provided the strongest link.

weltanschauung • \VELT-ahn-show-ung ("ow" as in "cow")\ • noun, often capitalized

: a comprehensive conception or apprehension of the world especially from a specific standpoint

Example Sentence:
Nadia dreads visiting her cousin, whose narrow, provincial Weltanschauung contrasts sharply with her own open-minded view of the world.

Did you know?
The German word "Weltanschauung" literally means "world view"; it combines "Welt" ("world") with "Anschauung" ("view"), which ultimately derives from the Middle High German verb "schouwen" ("to look at" or "to see"). When we first adopted it from German in the mid-19th century, "weltanschauung" referred to a philosophical view or apprehension of the universe, and this sense is still the most widely used. It can also describe a more general ideology or philosophy of life.

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One key to a bright future is a healthy shot of people in the creative class. People in creative fields — scientists, engineers, architects, educators, writers, artists and entertainers — are catalysts of vitality and livability in a city.

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• Terrorist Bombings in London (2005)
  On July 7, 2005, four bombs struck the London public transportation system during the morning rush hour, killing 56 people, including four of the perpetrators, and injuring 700. The incident was the deadliest single act of terrorism in the United Kingdom since the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, which killed 270 people. A group called "Al Qaeda in Europe" claimed responsibility for the attacks.