Indiana Witnesses a Spike in Identity Theft and Data Breaches
Covid19’s outburst has resulted in exponential growth in online banking, purchasing, and eCommerce, posing increased threats of potential crimes such as terrorist financing, identity theft, and other criminal activity.
Based on QuoteWizard’s Federal Trade Commission data analysis, these types of cybercrime are experiencing explosive growth, and Indiana is one of the states with the most significant increase.
According to a QuoteWizard study, identity theft was twice as prevalent in ten states between 2019 and 2022. Indiana ranked 11th with a 94% increase in percentage, leaving residents wondering why identity theft has increased dramatically in recent years and whether their identity is secure against such crimes.
During the same period, Rob Bhatt, an analyst at QuoteWizard, said that among the other Indiana findings, “bank fraud was up 158% in Indiana, and then credit card fraud was up 122%.”
According to Scott Shackelford, Indiana University’s director of the Center for Applied Cybersecurity Research, the sudden surge is believed to be related to the spike in data breaches.
“If you look at just the data breaches reported to the Indiana Attorney General’s Office, more than 100,000 Hoosiers’ personal information was compromised just last year,” said Shackelford.
According to data compiled by the Indiana Attorney General’s Office, there is no evidence that the problem is slowing down. Tens of thousands of Indiana residents may have been affected by over 300 system breaches reported in the first three months of this year.
Therefore, how can one ensure that their personal information is protected, and what should be done if it has been compromised? There is no guarantee that personal information will be compromised when a security breach occurs. As a result, preventative measures are required.
Shackelford recommended, “Change those passwords. You may consider using a password manager like Keychain on Apple products or LastPass or OnePass. That can help.”
Consumers can subscribe to credit monitoring and identity verification services that provide alerts regarding unusual activity or attempts to open new credit accounts and verifies the person is exactly who he claims to be.
It is also possible to freeze your credit. To do this, contact Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion – Indiana’s three credit reporting agencies. When a person’s credit lines are frozen, anyone trying to open a new credit account will be blocked. Consumers need to unfreeze their accounts before establishing a new credit line.
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