Signs Of Identity Theft

Identity theft can happen to your both in the online and offline worlds. When it happens, a criminal can easily assume your identity and gain access to your bank accounts, your credit cards and other financial instruments that are valuable to you.

There is a world of headaches that will be unleashed when criminals gain control of your finances. It is therefore imperative for you to understand some signs that may begin to show when your identity has fallen into criminal hands. Here are four of the most common signs that you have been victimized:

• Collection agencies start contacting you about debts or charges which you are not responsible. Once criminals start spending on your credit card, they will certainly not be paying those charges off. And because the charges were made in your name, the credit card companies will unleash their collectors on you.
  
  Be on the lookout for suspicious activites and charges in your monthly credit card statements especially if these unknown charges start occuring on a regular basis. Also be very suspicious when your statements do not arrive anymore. Very soon you will find collectors calling on you because of the unpaid charges that you are not aware of because of the statements not arriving at all.


• Creditors start contacting you about applications you never made. Imagine picking up the phone and someone cheerfully congratulating you on the other end about being approved for the loan on the beach front house that you wanted to buy. And you say to yourself "what loan? what beach front house?".
  
  Then it starts to slowly dawn on you that some criminal has decided to buy an expensive house on your account. This will be one of the worst inconveniences you will ever encounter in your life.


• You are being disapproved for credit wherein you should be financially qualitified. This is the flipside of the second item above. You decide to actually apply for a loan but get turned down when you know for a fact that all your finances and credit standing should back you up. But because your identity has now been severely turned upside down by an impostor, you no longer have the ability to apply for loans which you normally would have been qualified for.


• Withdrawals from your bank account that you never made. This is self-explanatory. With your identity in their hands, criminals can easily manipulate your bank accounts at will.

There may be some other signs along these lines and you should be always alert to spot them. Just keep in mind that when there is a sudden increase in strange activities in your credit card or bank account, you should already start contacting the institutions and establishments to alert them of possible fraud. Early detection and action will save a lof of unnecessary headaches.