Credit Card Report
Financial News Made Easy

If you aren’t using your credit cards due to the ongoing financial crisis, the recent flurry of news items about credit card fraud may have brought a wry smile to your face. At least you’re currently not at risk.

Yet it pays to be vigilant:

A former Countrywide Home Loans employee was charged last week with stealing and selling the private financial information of 2 million customers.

On Wednesday came the news that 1,500 people who purchased tickets from Alaska Airlines or Horizon Air have had their credit card information misused by an airline employee. The same day, headlines blared about the arrest of a gang of identity thieves who hijacked 41 million credit card numbers from U.S. retailers such as T.J. Maxx, Barnes & Noble and Forever21 during the past five years.

The good news about the global scam, relatively speaking, is that it involved only names and credit card numbers, not Social Security numbers that can be used to set up new accounts. Meanwhile, there are steps you can take to protect yourself.

Here, according to various financial professionals, are some of the things you can do to help protect yourself from credit card fraud:

1. Check your credit card statements. Take the time to make sure every charge is legitimate.
2. Check your credit report at least once a year. Go to www.annualcreditreport.com
3. Use a shredder. Don’t just throw your credit card statements — and any other personal information — in the trash. Crooks are not afraid to get their hands dirty if it means they can steal your ID and banking information.
4. Do not store your credit card information online. Many websites will offer to keep the information ’securely’ available so that you don’t have to enter it each time you make a purchase. Don’t do it. Take the extra 30 seconds or so it takes to complete the information.
5. Keep an eye on your card. If you have to hand your card to a clerk, do not let the card out of sight. If a waiter wants to run your card through a portable machine, refuse and instead pay at the cash register.
6. Check your receipt. You’d be surprised how often items are added — or prices are inflated — without your knowledge.
7. Practice safe computing. Invest in an encryption program. Learn how to use it (and please… remember to store your password in a safe place), and then use it diligently.
8. Use a secure filing system. Even at home it is necessary to keep your private information under lock and key. That way it is protected from snooping babysitters and relatives, as well as from thieves.