Protect Your Children from Identity Theft

Most people don’t realize that one of the largest groups of people at risk from identity theft is actually children and teenagers, and this is because it is difficult to think of them as consumers, and applicable for grown up things like credit products. However anyone can be a consumer, no matter what their age and this means that identity thieves can utilize the personal information of children and young adults to carry out a number of fraudulent crimes such as falsely applying for credit cards, bank accounts and loans in another person’s name or even using another identity to mask their own criminal activities.

What can you do?

There are a number of ways you can help to protect your family from identity thieves, and your first step should be to ensure that all of you and your children’s personal documents including driver licenses, passports, birth certificates and so on are kept in a secure place such as a safety deposit box. You should also avoid throwing away any papers without checking them first, and you should shred everything that has any of your family’s details on from names and addresses through to bank statements.

Another key way of protecting you and your children’s data is to request a copy of all of your consumer credit reports from the main credit bureaus Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. You can use these reports to check through your family’s credit history and make sure that there are no false or fraudulent applications for credit.

Children’s credit reports should be easy to read as they will be limited to just one or two credit products such as young savers accounts or starter checking accounts that you have helped them to set up, and by checking through credit reports regularly you can help to prevent thieves from misusing your family’s personal data. Equifax and Experian also offer identity protection services that can help you to monitor your credit reports and will alert you if any suspicious activity takes place.