Keeping Students Safe from America’s Fastest Growing Crime

Tips for College Students to Protect Themselves Against Identity Theft

IdentityTruth, the leading provider of a new breed of services to help consumers safeguard their privacy and identity, today announces tips for college students to help protect themselves against identity theft. According to the US Department of Education’s website, students are more vulnerable to identity theft “because of the availability of personal data and the way many students handle this data.” The site points to results of a national survey of college students, which determined that:
Almost half of all college students receive credit card applications on a daily or weekly basis. Many of these students throw out card applications without destroying them.
Nearly a third of students rarely, if ever, reconcile their credit card and checking account balances.
Almost 50 percent of students have had grades posted by Social Security number.

“Social networking sites have changed the way we communicate, and people are now sharing more and more sensitive information online – especially college students, who are the most active users of those sites,” said Steven Domenikos, CEO of IdentityTruth. “Students need to be aware of these risks; by taking steps to protect themselves now, students can ensure the safety of their financial future.”

IdentityTruth shares tips for protecting against identity theft:
Savvy social networking: With millions of people using social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace – and sharing sensitive information such as their full name, date of birth and address information – there are countless opportunities for identity thieves. Students should set restrictions on their profiles so that only friends can view their information, and should delete history/cookies if accessing those sites through public computers.
Safer student IDs: When you go to the security office to get your student ID, be sure to ask that the school not to use your social security number as your college ID number.
Beware “phishing” text Messages: Neither your bank nor your credit card company will ever send you a text requesting login or account information, so if you get a message asking you to “verify” your login, delete it. To be safe, call your cell phone provider and opt-out of this marketing feature.
Smarter cell phone: Never store identifying names, companies, or login information on your cell phone. If you loose your cell phone, all this information can be easily extracted off your SIM Card and used to access your personal information. If you lose your cell phone, contact your provider immediately to report the loss.
Love your laptop: In recent years, 1 out of 4 data breaches affecting colleges and universities stemmed from the theft of laptops at the registrar’s office. To make your laptop safer, first – always make sure that your laptop is password protected. Second – purchase a computer security cable, which prevents your laptop from being removed from a stationary object. Last, ask your campus police department if they have a laptop engraving program – identity thieves may be less likely to steal laptops that are personally engraved.
Protect your desktop: Make sure your computer has the latest antivirus and spyware to protect you from invasion. Your personal information is always for sale in the hands of identity thieves.

Identity theft is America’s fastest-growing crime. More than 79 million identities will be lost this year alone with as many as 3 million social security numbers being stolen. Simple, credit monitoring is not enough. Only 15% of identity theft is credit-related (85% of identity fraud happens “outside” the credit system). IdentityTruth has discovered suspicious “identity events” for more than 1 out of 4 consumers who subscribe to its service.

IdentityTruth’s unique Faster than Fraud™ technology combines data from many different sources–going beyond simple credit-based protection to deliver a more complete picture of an individual’s identity risk.

The service continuously combines and analyzes any and all information that is discovered specific to an individual to detect suspicious activities, report possible fraud before it happens and provide concrete next-steps to resolve a problem that may arise.

About IdentityTruth

IdentityTruth is the leading provider of a new breed of service to help consumers safeguard their Privacy and Identity. IdentityTruth’s proprietary technology provides subscribers with advance notice of potential identity fraud so they can take better control to stop it before it becomes costly. IdentityTruth not only detects–but can actually predict–possible problems, and that is what makes IdentityTruth Faster than Fraud™. IdentityTruth is a privately-held, VC- funded company headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts. Investors include Argonaut Ventures and Stata Venture Partners. For more information, go to www.IdentityTruth.com or call 781-684-1300.

Contacts

Kel & Partners
Meagan J. Ellis, 617-904-9393, ext. 128
meagan {at} kelandpartners(.)com