One recent industry report counted an average of roughly 2,514 cybersecurity events every second across its customers’ networks. With technology advancing faster than many of us can keep up with, cybercriminals are getting smarter and faster and are finding new weak spots in our software and systems.
Since nearly every part of our lives is now integrated with the internet, from banking and investing to our personal records, many people don’t realize that smart financial habits and identity protection go hand in hand.
In this post, we will share how you can make identity protection a part of your routine to help safeguard your identity from cyber threats.
Key Takeaways:
- Identity protection is easier to keep up with when you break it into a routine: organize your accounts monthly, monitor them weekly, and protect them daily.
- Regularly reviewing your transactions and credit reports can help you catch fraud early, often while it's still a small charge.
- Everyday choices, like paying with a digital wallet and avoiding public Wi-Fi for sensitive transactions, can reduce your exposure to cyber threats.
Identity theft is certainly not a new threat, but the ways in which these crimes happen are evolving by the day. So, the habits we’ve been told for decades like never carry around your Social Security card, or cut up your credit card before throwing it away, are now the bare minimum. There’s a whole new set of habits to adopt to protect your identity.
Monthly Habits: Organize
You cannot practice cybersecurity if you don’t know what to protect. Your first step should be to take inventory of your digital footprint and organize it in a way that is easy for you to keep an eye on. Here are habits that you can do monthly to stay organized:
- Compile your financial accounts and notifications. To ensure you don’t forget an account, try putting all your apps in one folder on your phone, or bookmarking each login portal on your browser. Turn on transaction alerts so you’re notified of any charge over a certain amount or from unrecognized sources.
- Audit your accounts and close out any you aren’t using. Inactive accounts can be some of the most vulnerable to attackers. If you have an account with personal or financial information linked to it that you are not using or checking monthly, consider closing it, locking the account, or simply removing saved payment methods from sites. Before closing out a credit card or any line of credit, keep in mind that it can lower your credit score.
- Review your account passwords and update if necessary. When you are gathering your account information, check to make sure each account password is strong and unique. Avoid using easily guessed passwords like a name, birthday, anniversary, etc. Change your password whenever you receive a breached password notification or notice a weak or duplicated password. Keeping track of countless unique passwords can be tricky; try using a password manager to keep an active record of all your login information.
Weekly Habits: Monitor
Once all your accounts are organized and you know what you’re protecting, the next step is keeping an eye on your activity and staying alert for red flags. Here are things you can do weekly to stay vigilant:
- Review your recent activity in all financial accounts. If you see any unfamiliar activity, get to the bottom of it. If you cannot confirm exactly what the activity is, call your bank or credit card company to report suspicious activity. In many cases, fraudsters will test a stolen card with a small charge like $1.49, before making larger transactions. Don’t assume just because it is a small transaction, it is nothing to worry about.
- Check your credit report. Similar to checking your account activity, it’s important to check your credit reports from all three national credit bureaus (Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax) for signs of unfamiliar accounts or credit applications. If you spot any unauthorized activity, you should immediately dispute it with the credit bureau, contact the company that opened the account, and report identity theft to IdentityTheft.gov. While not a weekly habit, another protective measure you can take is freezing your credit at all three bureaus. This is free and essentially blocks lenders from viewing your credit report, making it harder for cybercriminals to open fraudulent credit accounts in your name.
Daily Habits: Protect
Keeping your accounts organized and monitoring your activities are vital in identifying threats when they appear. The daily habits below help keep problems from starting in the first place:
- Use a digital wallet when possible. Believe it or not, in many ways, using your phone’s digital wallets can be safer than tapping, swiping or inserting a physical card. When you pay using a card in your digital wallet, the store gets a stand-in number instead of your real card number, plus a one-time code for that purchase. If that store gets hacked, your real card number isn’t in their system. Using a digital wallet also means you don’t have to carry around a physical card that could be lost or compromised.
- Keep your devices protected. Make sure to lock or turn off all devices whenever you are not actively using them. Having outdated software can also increase your vulnerability to cyberattacks. To avoid this, set up automatic updates or be sure to push updates as soon as they are available.
- Watch your digital activity in public. Avoid making sensitive transactions when you are on a public Wi-Fi network. For example, completing a credit application when you are working at a coffee shop on their free Wi-Fi.
Bottom Line
No matter how disciplined you are about cybersecurity, there’s still a chance that an attack could slip through the cracks. The best you can do is to stay vigilant and put protections in place where you can.
Protecting your identity means protecting your financial security. So, make identity protection part of your existing financial planning routine.
If you’d like to learn more about how to recognize scammer tricks and set up robust digital defenses, watch a replay of our webinar, Don’t Be Tricked: How to Stay Safe from Identity Theft, Financial Scams and Cybercrime.