Repair Credit FAST Will Not Happen If One Of These Thieves Targets You!

by Mike · 1 comment

Repair credit fast (or slow or even at all) will not happen if you become a victim of Identity Theft! And I’m speaking from experience. I’m not going to jump into details about my two brushes with these cowards…it’s too frickin’ painful and unnecessary.

You absolutely MUST take action on 5 quick, simple steps to protect your identity…or else.

A guy named Charlie from Rhode Island emailed me the other day.

Turns out Charlie used to be an Identity Thief! Now, can you imagine my shock at receiving this email?

At first, I didn’t know if the email was real. I too get a TON of spam.

But the email used my name (not “Dear Sir”) and his first line was, “I don’t you probably won’t believe what I’m about to tell you….”

Charlie (if that’s his real name) apparently never got caught stealing people’s identities. He claims he “lived” off his “skill” for more than 5 years.

Charlie has offered to talk with me and answer any questions I have about (his kind) of identity theft. I plan to take him up on the offer.

For now, Charlie mentioned a couple things in his short email I want to share with you.

Click Read More below now for a couple tips about protecting yourself from exploding identity theft.

THE UNPLEASANT SURPRISE….

The following 5 tips should be common sense. According to Charlie, he never had to resort to “high-tech” methods to steal his way to a “good” living for more than 5 years.

He claims the “low-tech” methods were too easy and widespread. Hmm. Interesting…..

  1. Buy a shredder – and use it! Shred any and all junk you receive, not just credit card bills and personal papers. The smaller the pieces, the less likely a dumpster diver can find your bank account and credit card numbers.
  2. Review your 3 free credit reports at least once a year. If you’ve read anything I’ve shared with you, this is a no-brainer. This lets you spot the first signs of identity theft, such as address changes, unpaid bills or new accounts.
  3. Remove your name from the “crap” mail! Here’s another way the money-grubbing Big 3 make money off your bad credit by selling your contact info to the highest bidder. Opt out for five years by calling toll-free 1-888-5-OPTOUT (1-888-567-8688) or going to www.optoutprescreen.com (owned & operated by the Big 3) and following the directions.
  4. Review your credit card bill as soon as you receive it to make sure all of the charges listed really are yours. You absolutely MUST do this!  Yep, yours truly got hit on this a couple weeks at a local gas station. When I pay at the pump, I don’t request a receipt but I don’t drive to the point I need to fill up at the same station two times in one day. That’s not happened. Just the other day, I received and reviewed my statement as I always do. **I always review my monthly statement. On my statement was a second charge for gas on the same day at the same station. Huh! I disputed the charge and discovered (much to my surprise) that this very practice is a growing epidemic. Apparently, I should have pressed the “clear” button on the pump. It appears an employee inside the store was able to use my card to buy gas using my card info! **Important** To keep this from happening to you or people you know, you must press the ‘CLEAR” button or your information will be stored until the next customer inserts his/her card. Be sure to tell all your friends & family to keep these thieves from tagging them!
  5. Protect your computer. If you’re stuck on a damn Windows machine (as I am too) and it’s connected to the Internet , you MUST get yourself a good virus suite such as AVG, Norton or Symantec. For virus protection, I  prefer AVG (there’s a free version as well). If there’s a better one, please let me know. By the way, my next computers will be MAC. I’m going back to Apple. I’m sick and tired of Windows and all the problems of XP & Vista.These operating systems are magnets for viruses and everything bad on the Internet.

Absolutely keep your virus definitions updated. I don’t visit spammy websites. And I don’t open attachments from unknown sources. Yet, it seems like every day this Windows XP machine is downloading some security patch. I’m sick of it! The more up-to-date your (and my) software patches, firewalls and virus protection are, the tougher it will be for a hacker to grab private information.

Repair credit fast? I don’t think so if you become an ID Theft victim. Follow these five simple steps today to protect yourself. It takes a lot less time to check through this list than it does to get your identity back again. Yep, I can attest to this one. You’d think, I’d be more vigilant about protecting my identity after being the victim two times. Once I check out this guy Charlie and hear what he has to say, I’ll let you know. For now, I’m leery. I get a bunch of “fruitcakes” contacting me, so I need a little proof. I hope the hell he doesn’t turn out to the person who kicked me around the block back in the mid 80′s.

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{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }

Josh Maxwell October 26, 2008 at 2:31 am

You know, I have to tell you, I really enjoy this blog and the insight from everyone who participates. I find it to be refreshing and very informative. I wish there were more blogs like it. Anyway, I felt it was about time I posted, I?ve spent most of my time here just lurking and reading, but today for some reason I just felt compelled to say this.

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