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Those in HRIS, whose specific function is the management of “people data”, must take ownership of this emerging liability, and ensure that their companies are as safe and as prepared as possible. A task force of HR, IT, Security, and Risk Management professionals and managers must be identified and trained, and procedures for a “call to action” defined – in advance. The communication must say what happened, that a small, empowered task force has been marshaled, that temporary “lock down” procedures are in place to prevent further similar exposure, that investigation is under way, that affected employees will be given recovery assistance and reimbursement of recovery expenses, and monitoring services to prevent actual identity thefts using any compromised data. Keeping your valuable documents in a lock box is a great place to start, if you have not already done so. The Social Security numbers of children are often extremely valuable because they do not have any information associated with them yet. Multiple, redundant strategies are usually required – strong passwords, multi-factor authentication, access audits, employee training, and employee security agreements, for example. So part of your mission is to make sure that your network and system passwords and access controls are really robust.

Procedures for likely scenarios (laptop loss, backup tape loss, network login breach, theft of physical HR files, etc.) should be predefined. Credit card fraud is one of the most common types of identity theft. Companies that offer identity monitoring services check databases that collect different types of information to see if they contain new or inaccurate information about you. Proactively watching out for all types of identity theft,which includes credit commercial fraud prevention. If you’re like most people, you use credit cards everywhere, from the supermarket to the neighborhood coffee shop. Just like obscentity, judges will know “reasonable safeguards” when they see them – or don’t. If you don’t receive regular mail, contact your local post office. To protect your business from identity theft, update your business filings as soon as any of your business contact information changes and check your business’ filings with the Secretary of State’s office at least once a year. You should immediately notify your local law enforcement authorities of any unauthorized changes. To put things in perspective, there were 11,000 reports in 2019 and 20,940 in 2020. Unfortunately, the numbers for 2021 don’t look promising, as the authorities received almost 13,000 identity theft reports by the end of July.

As experts themselves suggest, the only sure way to prevent this kind of information theft is through closer credit card monitoring. May be responsible for the stolen information. Checking your account balances isn’t always fun, but not doing so means you could miss fraudulent transactions that indicate your identity has been stolen. Because you need to both know and show that you’re doing all that could reasonably be expected to secure employee’s personal data which is in your care. In short, you need to do the right thing, and you need to very publicly show that you’re doing it. For those of you who have already been targeted by identity thieves, bellow is information you need to do to minimize the damage. On a typical day you’re likely to encounter dozens of ways your identity can be stolen, even if you’re quite careful with your personal information. They can even file a tax return in your name and get your refund money. In financial identity theft, the thief may open a checking account, get access to existing accounts, obtain a credit card or other line of credit, or declare bankruptcy in the victim’s name.

You should scan your account statements and your credit report frequently for purchases you didn’t make and lines of credit you didn’t request. You are eligible for a free report from each of the three major credit bureaus once a year, so request one every few months in addition to reviewing other financial statements at least weekly. “Reviewing your bank accounts, credit card statements and credit reports regularly won’t necessarily prevent identity theft, but it will help you catch it early before you incur too much damage,” says Brianna Jensen, an identity theft expert with consumer security site ASecureLife. In recent years, identity theft reports note a shift in the income levels that criminals target. In the past, criminals focused on stealing identity books – they now collect diverse personal information, whether an email address or a phone number, and then use the information collectively to take a customer’s identity.