Preventing Identify Theft

Teachers and students are not aware of many ways that identity theft incidences occur. This year, 4.6 percent of the population has been a victim. These victims spend approximately $800 per incident trying to clear up the problems that they face. With the new knowledge I acquired at the Georgia Educational Technology Conference in the fall of 2004, I have a responsibility to share with my colleagues and pupils ways to prevent identity theft.

Mr. Caylen Tichenor kept his audience spell-bound with his stories of identity theft and his wonderful suggestions. He is on staff at the Oconee County RESA. His notes, which are on their RESA web site (see Presentations and Handouts), offer many more ideas that are valuable for students and teachers.

As a teacher, my responsibility after a conference is to share information that can make a difference to my colleagues. Teachers are busy, so my plan to share many suggestions about ways to curb identity theft is to add such notes to my signature on my email. A teacher will read a short sentence at the end of an email but might not read an entire email with numerous suggestions.

Some of the best hints at this conference which I am in the process of doing are as follows:

Call 888-567-8688 and ask to have your name removed from the list so that you will not continue to receive pre-approved credit card applications. Someone could easily get one of these out of your mailbox.
Only use ATM’s at banks because a scanning device could have been placed in the slot where you slide your card. If an ATM ever seems difficult to work, stay away.
Rules are changing so that the consumer will start being able to get a free credit report from each of the 3 credit bureaus. Spread out your requests about every 4 months.
Call each of your credit card companies and ask them to flag your account that you want to be notified if anyone ever requests any changes on your account (change of address, higher limits, etc.)
Not only do you need anti-virus and spy blocking software on your computer, but you also need 2 firewalls – one for your hard drive and one for software. When you work on your computer, you do not want the world to be watching you!

Students today are quite computer savvy. Since the beginning of video games, children are “click happy.” They are accustomed to moving quickly through those games, so they want to click on most everything on internet sites. In the computer lab, teachers need to establish rules which include clicking on no pop up ads, closing any internet sites that look questionable, and using no links from any of those questionable sites. Students must learn to NEVER enter their names on any sites used at school.

Being aware, being wise, being proactive can help keep you hidden from the eyes of the internet world. Don’t let the criminals find you. Keep yourself and your information as private as possible.