My Experience with Identity Theft

People suck.

Okay, people who have nothing better to do than try to scam other people out of their hard-earned money suck.

There, I fixed it.

It’s been two years since I had my identity stolen. I was reminded of this last week when I realized the month of July was coming to an end and I hadn’t yet requested my credit report from the three credit bureaus (Equifax, TransUnion and Experian). Because this is a thing that I have to do now.

Here I was going about my life one afternoon back in 2019 when I received a text from my bank asking to confirm some charges. This was not a normal occurrence. Of course, I spent forty bucks in Costco and six at McDonald’s over my lunch hour, but the pending one-thousand-dollar transfer to a bank that I have no affiliation with made my heart stop. I indicated that the last transaction was not me and mercifully the transfer was blocked. My heart started beating again, albeit rapidly. Thus began my journey as a victim of identity fraud.

Before 2019, I periodically checked my credit report. Mainly because it was the adult thing to do. There was nothing to see there. After my run in with the nefarious entity that tried to steal my money, I had to immediately run my reports to ensure that there had been no additional fraudulent activity under my name. Thankfully nothing else was uncovered, but it was suggested that I run these checks[TL1] every year since it is likely that my information is still floating around out there on the darknet. Not at all reassuring. I also had a seven-year fraud alert placed on my profile with the three bureaus; this is an additional security measure that flags the opening of accounts and large financial activities to ensure that they are legitimate.

Having your identity stolen is so personal, such a violation. You wonder how your information got out ‘there’ in the first place, why you specifically were targeted. And it takes work to resolve the situation or come as close to a resolution as possible.

In my case, I filed a police report on the off chance that the person that stole or used my stolen information to try to get cash could be sought out and penalized (which didn’t happen). I worked with the fraud department of the bank that opened the phony account to get it closed. I learned that some banks allow you to open a checking account solely online, no in-person visit required. I reached out to the information security department for my employer to see if there had been a company breach. I reminded myself that millions of people per year are victims of identity theft. Nothing special about it happening to me.

Still.

It did happen to me. And I feel some type of way about it.

This is different than getting your debit card involuntarily replaced by your bank because it was presumably used somewhere sketchy. That does irk me, though. Like, who are these undisclosed merchants so that I know not to use my card there? And why do said merchants have the right to have their identity concealed? I’d think that the consumer would have the privilege of a little insight there, but clearly that’s not the case.

Ironically, I have always been the person to tear up or shred mail with my name and address on it. That didn’t help me here, if ever. Now I check my online footprint often, seeing what, if any, pictures, or content come up under my name. I request removal of anything personal – address, DOB, familial connections. When making transactions, I’m more careful to shield my pin number when typing into the pad at checkout, I check for skimming devices and I use my credit card for gas and most online purchases. This is just how it is now. Don’t get me wrong, things could obviously be worse. I could have been taken for thousands of dollars without any recourse. I recognize the blessing there. What it comes down to is the inconvenience of both the immediate and continual steps that need to be taken to ensure that my credit profiles reflect my legitimate accounts and transactions. It’s the constant reminder that it happened once and could happen again. But I deal with it because it needs to be dealt with.

Like I said, people suck.

Have you ever been the victim of identify fraud? What was your experience and resolution?