I get emails from consumers all over the United States and even in other countries, pointing out the latest scams to separate you from your precious identity. You never know how clever an identity thief can be until one slips under your radar. Don’t let it happen to you! Take a look at these sneaky tales of identity theft and protect yourself from anything like them happening to you.

Cell Phone Trickery

A woman had her handbag – containing her cell phone, wallet, credit cards, etc., stolen from her grocery cart. She called her husband a short twenty minutes later to tell him what had happened and he said, “I received your text asking about our Pin number and I replied a little while ago.” Need less to say, she hadn’t sent him any text. The thief had seen the “Hubby” number on her phone, texted a request for the PIN, and voila! Hundreds of dollars were gone from her ATM account.

Lessons to learn

• Don’t identify people or numbers by personal nicknames like “Hubby,” “Sweetheart,” or even “Home.”
• When you are asked for information, don’t assume you know who is asking. Call and speak to the person to confirm, and if you don’t know who it is, DON’T reveal the information.

Credit Card Switcheroo

A man went to his local gym and placed his belongings in a locker as usual. When he returned after his workout he noticed the locker was open so he checked his belongings—wallet, cash, keys, phone, everything in place. Nothing appeared to be missing. And yet, when he returned from vacation and finally found time to review his bank statements, he was stunned to see that charges totaling a whopping $14,000 where made on his debit card. Apparently, the thief had stolen his card and replaced it with another credit card—an expired one—issued by the same bank. The man hadn’t noticed because didn’t use it regularly.

Worst of all, the credit card company refused to pay the charges because the card had not been reported stolen. Ouch!

Lessons to learn

• Check carefully when something suspicious happens. Your personal information is worth a few minutes of looking at everything in your wallet if you suspect that someone has been snooping.
• Have a special set of gym-only stuff that travels with you to that locker room so you aren’t leaving everything about yourself in one easily compromised place.
• If you don’t want your life tipped upside down due to a thief stealing your wallet (or identity) –then you need LifeLock. WalletLock, a service included in a LifeLock membership, takes the time, panic and hassle out of a lost or stolen wallet.

As you can see, the people who would steal your identity are getting craftier, so you have to become even more careful. Don’t let these scams happen to you! With knowledge there’s power and with power there’s peace of mind –and with peace of mind there’s LifeLock!

I’ve got a scary number for you: Security experts estimate that as many as ten million personal computers are infected with viruses designed to steal your personal information.

If that doesn’t make your hair stand on end, then listen to this: Panda Security found that at least one percent of the 67 million people who utilized their free ActiveScan to test their computers last year were infected with malicious Trojan software programs. That’s 670,000 computers. They estimate that if 1 percent of the computers in homes across the world actually downloaded malware without knowledge of it, it’s safe to estimate then that over ten million computers worldwide could potentially be infected with software capable of stealing its contents—and along with that, personal identities.

The scary numbers just keep coming. According to Panda, their detection rate rose to over 800 percent between the middle of 2008 and the end of the year. Victims are usually infected after being duped into downloading virus programs through fake websites or pop-ups.

Malicious programs such as key logger spyware can go undetected for quite a period of time, whether or not the latest antivirus updates are installed. And once these destructive programs are downloaded onto a computer, every keystroke made—including credit card numbers entered, Social Security numbers typed, banking information and passwords input—are then in the hands of the bad guys. Thieves have become technologically savvy. In fact, Panda reported that more than a third of the PCs they found to be infected had fully-functional and recently-updated anti-virus programs installed.

Here are some of the highlights from Panda’s study on the evolution of online identity theft:

• Over three million of the audited users in the U.S. and more than 10 million users worldwide were infected with active identity theft-based malware in 2008
• 1.07 percent of all PCs scanned in 2008 were infected with active malware (resident in memory during the scan) related to identity theft, such as banker Trojans
• 35 percent of the infected PCs had up-to-date antivirus software installed
• The number of PCs infected with identify theft malware increased by 800 percent from the first half of 2008 to the second half

A few tips to help protect your computer and your identity;

• 1. If you are using a shared computer, always delete any personal information and passwords you may have entered.
• 2. Never click on pop-ups or embedded links contained in email from an unknown source, even if it says, “You have been sent a postcard from your friend!” These are most likely fronts for “phishing” scams. DON’T CLICK.
• 3. Use care when picking passwords. Don’t use passwords containing public information that a trained identity thief can easily crack. Hint: your birth date, the name of your pet, and your mother’s maiden name are not as secret as you think.

I have one last number for you: The Federal Trade Commission estimates that over nine million consumers have had their identities stolen in the United States alone. Remember, the best way to prevent an identity theft is to plan for one. If your wallet is stolen, “who ya gonna call”? I know I’m going to call LifeLock, and leave the clean-up to them!

They show up in your e-mail inbox, messages with a subject line that reads, “You have received a Valentine’s card” or “Your sweetheart has sent you a Valentine’s Day greeting.” Some may even indicate that, “The flowers you ordered for your sweetie won’t be delivered unless you log in and re-enter your credit card information.” But look out, Cupid. With February 14th fast approaching, you need to be on the alert for spam e-mails that are anything but romantic!

Tens of millions of fake Valentine’s Day greeting-card messages will be sent out this Valentine’s Day, and it’s likely you will receive one. The e-mail will direct you to click on a link to retrieve your special electronic e-card. Beware. When you click on the link, a virus and malicious malware may be triggered to download onto your computer. The spyware that is installed often includes a key-logger program, which tracks the sites you visit while also logging every keystroke you make on your computer. Key-logger software can record user names, passwords, account numbers and personal PIN numbers, too. Ultimately, every key you press on the keyboard is captured. Everything you type into word-processing documents, spreadsheets or e-mail programs is recorded too.

These spyware and malware programs typically run without your knowledge and are difficult to detect, and they continue to run in the background until they are detected and removed. If you receive a notice that a greeting card has been sent to you, before you even consider opening on an attachment or clicking on an embedded link, first check with the person it claims to be from and determine whether or not they actually sent it. Under no circumstances should you blindly trust that the card is legitimate simply because the e-mail looks legitimate. If you discover that the e-mail is spam, delete it immediately—without clicking on the links.

If you have already received a greeting card message and clicked on its links, there are still steps you can take to protect yourself. First, you should install up-to-date virus protection on your computer and run a full virus scan on your hard drive. If you find that your computer has been infected, you should then place a fraud alert on your credit files with each of the big three credit reporting agencies (Trans Union, Experian and Equifax). You only need to contact one credit bureau and they will alert the other two agencies. Sorry to say, if you want the alert to stay on your accounts, you will need to reset it every three months days. After 90 days, the alert automatically expires. Or you can engage an identity theft protection service like LifeLock to set and renew them for you every 90 days.

With fraud alerts in place, creditors, lenders, or other prospective users of your consumer report must take steps to verify your identity before they can issue new credit, increase credit lines, and obtain utilities, cell phones or new loans. Most of the time, when someone else is trying to use your identity to get credit, the fraud alert will stop them.

It’s also important to note that often scammers will instruct you to call a provided phone number. Never dial an unsolicited number provided in an unsolicited e-mail, text or voice mail, even if it purports to come from a company you deal with regularly. Instead, take the time to look up the legitimate phone number of the company and call that instead.

There are, of course, variations to these types of phishing and spoofing scams.

Spoofing scams occur when criminals create a false or “shadow” copy of a real website or e-mail. This allows the “spoofer” to acquire personal information such as passwords, credit card numbers, and account numbers. Even though the e-mail looks like the real thing—complete with authentic logos and working web links—it’s just an elaborate fake. The website where you’re instructed to enter your account information into -is also fake. In some instances, really slick spoofers direct you to a genuine website and then arrange a pop up a window to appear over the site. Any information entered, goes straight to the spoofer. Your information will most likely be sold to criminals who’ll use it to drain your accounts, ruin your credit and steal you and your sweetheart’s name!

Follow these tips to prevent having more than your heart stolen this Valentine’s Day!

• Do not respond to unsolicited (spam) e-mail.
• Do not click on links contained within an unsolicited e-mail.
• Be cautious of e-mail claiming to contain pictures in attached files as these files may contain viruses.
• Open attachments only from known senders.
• Avoid filling out forms in e-mail messages that ask for personal information.
• Always compare the link in the e-mail to the link that you are actually directed to.
• Log on to the official website instead of “linking” to it from an unsolicited e-mail.
• Contact the actual business that supposedly sent the e-mail to verify if the e-mail is genuine.
• Make sure you have a firewall and up-to-date antivirus software running on your computer at all times.
• Update any available Security Patches.

You might want to think twice before sending an electronic Valentine’s Day Card this year. Remember instead that “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend” and guys rarely read through our cards!

It is difficult to imagine the amount of time and mental energy it takes to restore a stolen or compromised identity…until it happens to you! We’ve all heard the bad news… declining stocks, job losses, frozen credit markets, and mortgage foreclosures. With the economy in this state, there’s never been a more important time for everyone to get control over their finances, their credit and their very identity.

When inaccurate or fraudulent data finds its way into your credit reports, you may pay a high price for that contaminated data. When it comes to buying an automobile, financing a home or obtaining credit, it’s all about three little numbers – our credit score.

Our credit scores are directly linked to the price of a car or home we can afford. These all-powerful numbers affect both the affordability of insurance premiums as well as our interest rates and ultimately, often become the deciding factor in whether or not we can drive the car we want or purchase the home that seems a perfect for our family.

Odds are pretty good we could be paying a steep price for someone else’s errors or crime, as results of several studies point out that;

• one in four credit reports have errors,
• data breaches are at an all time high, and
• an identity theft occurs every 3 seconds

Identity theft (or inaccurate credit reporting) is often exacerbated by the fact that consumers typically don’t review their credit reports. Oftentimes consumers are complacent or have a false belief… “It won’t happen to me”. That false belief and complacency can get people into deep trouble.

In 2008, “reported” data breaches increased a whopping 47% over 2007, making it easy to see that we really have very little control over our information. Data breaches will continue to occur and thieves will continue to find ingenious methods to hijack, and then sell our personal information.

The truth of the matter is, in a bad economy, scam artists will work overtime and identity theft will spike. January is both Financial Awareness Month and a great time to act on your new year’s resolutions. Aside from getting your finances in order, consider initiating a plan of action should this be the year your identity is stolen or compromised. Remember, the best way to prevent an identity theft - is to plan for one! If you don’t get control over your finances and identity – someone else surely will.

Aside from asking yourself “What’s in your wallet?” ask yourself “Would you know who to call – or what to do… if it suddenly went missing?

Medical identity theft, by definition, is what results when a thief steals someone else’s social security number or health insurance information in order to obtain medical benefits of their own, particularly in the form of hospital visits and prescription drugs. The two facets of medical identity theft involve financial breaches of security and healthcare fraud. Long-term detrimental effects can easily result from this increasingly prevalent type of identity theft.

Medical identity theft is not as easy to detect or reverse as are the more common forms of identity fraud. This type of identity theft has left victims with tainted health records, medical histories, and diagnoses. Victims may receive bills for medications, tests and even surgeries that they never had done. In order to ensure your own adequate identity theft protection, always be on the look out for medical service bills, records and notations that are not and were never applicable to your own history. If at any time you receive a bill for a service you never received, or you’re asked questions regarding an unknown medical condition, you’ve probably been victimized. Some victims of medical identity theft have even received faulty blood transfusions due to their records indicating the wrong blood type. So not only can this crime ruin your credit, it can also be potentially life-threatening.

Thieves often fail to pay their shares of insurance deductibles and co-pays, leaving their victims to receive credit reports detailing unrecognizable medical debts. Having a working knowledge of identity theft prevention techniques will help you protect yourself from this damaging crime. It is estimated that 1 in 6 Americans don’t have insurance, making it very tempting for some people to engage in medical identity theft, especially when emergency situations arise. If, heaven forbid, someone uses your personal data in an emergency care facility, they are very likely to get away with it as these facilities cannot refuse care and are less likely to catch the error in the first place.

To date, there are no government statistics as to the number of medical identity fraud cases occurring annually in the United States, but insurance providers and hospitals agree that this type of theft is presenting itself more and more. Approximately 250,000 Americans have been victims of medical identity theft thus far, according to the World Privacy Forum. If you think your medical records and insurance data are safe, never underestimate a thief’s ability to get their hands on your information. And because insurance companies share patient information, should you decide to switch to another provider in the future, your tarnished medical history just might follow you.

Should a medical identity thief ever use your good name to seek treatment, you could be refused insurance coverage later–depending on the treatment they sought. It’s no secret that insurance agencies can and will refuse coverage to people with histories of certain drug use or pre-existing conditions.

Here are a few medical identity theft protection tips for you and your loved ones to keep in mind:

• Any notices from your insurance carrier should be opened immediately.
• If you’re ever informed of or billed for treatment you didn’t receive, dispute it right away.
• Always shred these documents before throwing them in the trash.
• Be diligent about checking your credit report and dispute any unknown medical accounts with credit reporting agencies, as well as your insurance company.
• If you receive mail from a doctor’s office or hospital where you haven’t been a patient, don’t just assume it’s junk. Open these immediately, as they could be bills for services to which you weren’t privy.
• Let credit agencies know so they can put fraud alerts on your file. Also let your insurance company know right away.

If you lead a hectic lifestyle and don’t especially want to spend your free time placing fraud alerts, ordering credit reports, opting out of junk mailing lists, and can’t fathom spending months or years trying to restore your identity if stolen, then consider doing what I did…enroll in LifeLock and turn the burden of protecting your life over to them!

~ Denise Richardson, Author of Give Me Back My Credit