• Identity Theft: is when your personal identification information - social security number, date of birth, drivers license - is stolen and used to establish a new Identity or credit in your name.
• Identity Fraud: usually involves the unauthorized use of credit and debit cards, where there's zero or limited liability so long as the unauthorized use is reported.

Identity theft is more costly and takes far longer to detect and even longer to remedy than credit card fraud.

In 2007 the number of victims of Identity Fraud decreased to 8,400,000 which represents 23,000 victims per day or 16 victims per minute.  This represented a $49.3 billion loss to consumers and businesses.  Even with the increase emphasis on this crime the number of identity fraud victims increased 22% in 2008 to 9,900,000.*

Some facts on time and cost to restore a loss:

• Consumers spend on average $691 (up from $554) in 2006 to clear up a fraud and on average $1500 to clear up a Theft.
• Victims spend on average 40 hours to repair damage from Identity Fraud and on average 328 hours repairing the damage done due to Identity Theft.

One should remember that most of your restoration will have to be done during business hours as those businesses and organizations that you have to contact are not open in the evening or on the weekend.

This crime is here for the long run and even if you take every precaution possible, to protect your identity that does not ensure you that you are protected.  In 2006 businesses across the United States lost 88,000,000 records containing non-public information of their customers, employees and vendors.  This number increased 40% in 2007 to 124,000,000 records compromised.  In 2008 the number of data breaches increased 47% over the 2007 figure.

The following pages are designed to show what, as an individual or business you can do to minimize your risk of loss.  Remember there is no solution that will ever completely ensure that you will have no loss, however there are a number of things that you can do to minimize your exposure to loss.