Show Fights ID D Th The ff Chris Jenkins Contributing Writer Sky leur is a recent graduate of Brigham Young University With a anew anew anew new job and a new wife was just getting ready to begin his life What was unaware of was that nearly 2500 miles away someone was using his identity It wasn't until the two newlyweds decided to buy buya a home that they learned of ofa a problem with their credit To their surprise they did not qualify They were told that because had outstanding acco accounts on multiple credit cards they were ineligible for the loan Shocked by this revelation decided to investigate After receiving a copy of he found his credit report that six credit cards had opened in his name been somewhere in Miami He now had in in debt deb that he could not account is just one for U of f many According to experts out of four Americans one their identity will have their lifetime in stolen ident identity is persons person's When a caught early not stolen if ruin their credit it can victims have many As the damage dam dam- repairing found identity theft by age caused expensive and be an can an lengthy process to the Federal According identity Trade C Commission most ted is the the most reported theft United States crime in the in a row crow fifth year for the represents 40 percent percent per per- It now nw rep complaints all rt cent of the FTC with WWI received by I S See continued Theft on page 3 I Theft continued from front citizens falling victim last year Up from the previous year when only cases were reported Surprisingly while complaints were reported the FTC estimated that approximately ten million consumers consumers consumers con con- sumers were affected by identity theft last year Consumers are encouraged to report sJ identity theft to the Ff FTC jin Jn r ter er to to help investigators new scams It It is also important to report any incident of identity theft to local law enforcement agencies because the law only protects people people people peo peo- who have filed police reports that confirm the incident There are several ways consumers can help protect themselves from the danger of identity theft Consumers should never give giveout giveout giveout out their personal information over the telephone through email or to any person or organization whose credentials cannot be veri veri- v ri- ri fied Social Security Cards and other documents should be kept in ina a safe place Important docu- docu such as bank bajik statements ments Jl t i ian Tr r r N t j an and rJ d ere credit It cards caras's should h ou l be e s shred shred- re dedI 01 destroyed before ed before be being ng thrown away Only give out but your Social Security number or other personal information when absolutely necessary People should also beware of any promotions or offers that seem too good to be true They should be especially suspicious of offers received through the internet since approximately half of all cases of identity theft reported last year were internet related Identity theft is becoming more common and some predict that the trend is only increasing Credit reports should be checked regularly for suspicious changes or r activity c i Luckily consumers 1 r can hn r u. p t l p themselves erv s- s by being aWare of the threat and by limiting the access criminals have to personal tion |