Child Identity Theft

Child identity theft is something few of us think about, but it occurs over 400,000 times a year, according to the Federal Trade Commission. That means identity thieves are stealing the identities of children under the age of eighteen and destroying their credit, before they should even have credit! Imagine discovering your six-year-old has delinquent credit cards that are now in collection! This is NOT what you want for your children.

Kids identity theft can be easily prevented by taking the following steps once your children have social security numbers:

1. Place a freeze on your children's credit reports to prevent identity thieves from opening up credit using your child's identity.
2. Request your free credit reports once a year to make sure nothing has changed.
3. If your child receives anything solicitations in the mail for credit cards or loans, contact the company sending the solicitation and inform them that the child is under age.

For maximum security and convenience, I recommend using LifeLock, who will place fraud alerts on your credit reports, request your credit reports once a year, and do several other things to protect you from identity theft. They will even help you clean up any problems that occur while a paying customer, including up to a million dollars of financial assistance. I use LifeLock personally, and I have found them to be a good service. I do not have time to keep track of the various alerts and notices that have to be sent to each of the three credit reporting agencies on a regular basis, or to remember when to order my free copies of our credit reports. LifeLock makes it all very simple for a very reasonable fee.

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