Connecticut Better Business Bureau urges parents to take steps to protect their check their children’s personal identifiable information from identity thieves.
Many parents apply to get their newborn a Social Security number before leaving the hospital. The Social Security Administration (SSA) says registering infants enables parents to claim children as dependents for tax purposes, open a bank account for them, obtain medical coverage and apply for government services for the child.
Unfortunately, a child’s SS number can often be more valuable to thieves than an adult’s because children have pristine credit histories. Because the victims might not check their credit report for more than a decade, thieves can use their stolen identities for years without being detected.
As children approach adulthood, a stolen identity can cause real trouble with long term consequences, including unpaid debts, difficulty obtaining credit, and high interest rates on credit cards and loans. A poor credit history can also make it difficult to find a rental property and may even result in being turned down for a job.
There are several indications that your child’s identity may have been stolen:
- Your family is turned down for government benefits because they are being claimed by the identity thief
- The Internal Revenue Service may notify you that your child didn’t pay income tax or that their SS number was used on someone else income tax return
- Your child receives credit card statements or debt collection notices
- A child’s personal information may be put at risk when it is given out to schools, used to sign up for little league, applying for a library card or given out at a physician or dentist’s office.
- When asked for a child’s Social Security number, parents should ask why the number is required, how will it be used and protected, what happens if you decline to give it and whether an alternative proof of identity be used instead.
- Parents are urged to check a child’s credit report as they approach 16 years old, however, in light of the hacking of 80 million files from Anthem Insurance, it is preferable to immediately pull credit reports for all dependents covered by an Anthem policy and visit the company’s site for further instructions for free credit monitoring.
You may check credit reports free of charge at annualcreditreport.com or by telephone at (877)322-8228. If there are signs of unauthorized activity in your or your child’s credit report, BBB recommends filing a police report, alerting any one of the credit reporting companies to putting a freeze on credit reports, and informing lenders, banks and other financial institutions about the problem.
You will find additional details and step-by-step guidance on repairing ID theft damage in the “Get Consumer Help” pages at bbb.org, and at the Federal Trade Commission’s Identity Theft Resources web pages (www.consumer.ftc.gov/features/feature-0014-identity-theft).