Identity Theft Prevention Tips For College Graduates

Maybe you graduated from college recently. Or, you are the parent (or family member) of a recent graduate.

There are certain things college graduates need to know to be an informed consumer, and not get ripped off or scammed. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission created the "How To Be a Class-Value-dictorian" (Adobe PDF format) alert for college students and graduates. The FTC's advice:

1. Keep your personal information to yourself
2. Socialize safely online
3. Consider the National Do Not Call Registry
4. Stay away from “guarantees” of scholarships
5. Don’t buy bogus weight loss products
6. Understand credit and use annualcreditreport.com
7. Travel scams turn summer breaks into summer busts
8. Peer-to-peer file-sharing can be risky
9. Phishing scams reel in personal information
10. Some employment services are scams

To this list, I would add the following:

• Don't share publicly your friends' private information, especially on social networking sites (some Facebook members are already aware of this)
• Use strong passwords online
• Use anti-virus software on your home laptop/desktop and keep it current
• Learn how to recognize phishing e-mails and phishing websites
• Learn how to recognize ATM machines that has been tampered with by criminals
• Opt out of telemarketing and pre-approved credit card offers
• Use a snail-mail mailbox that locks
• Shred documents you no longer need that contain sensitive personal information
• Don't pay at the pump. Pay with credit/debit cards inside at the cashier
• Use a credit card when shopping, and not your debit card

What identity theft prevention advice would you give to college graduates?

Comments

[Anonymous]

As for college students, this is quite helpful for them to know the basics prevention tips. At least you have shown this.

[shredding Dallas]

Credit card companies thrive because of a large number of users and they should be able to protect their clients against ID theft. These companies may wrongly charge you for something that you did not purchase because someone else has used your account number - they should provide added protection or screening so that the number of fraud victims will decrease.