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How College Students Are Easy Victims Of Identity Theft
http://www.articlegaia.com/articles/151360/1/How-College-Students-Are-Easy-Victims-Of-Identity-Theft/Page1.html
Tony Francis
Before you can actually improve credit scores or build good credit, you have to consider what credit reports are. http://Free-Credit-Reports.com describes what a credit report looks like and what credit score information it contains. That's apart from distinguishing consumer credit reports and business credit reports for your understanding. 
By Tony Francis
Published on 02/21/2010
 
We cannot deny that identity theft is one of the worst crimes one can experience And it is also undeniable that it is one of the fastest growing crimes especially with the progression of the internet
We cannot deny that identity theft is one of the worst crimes one can experience. And it is also undeniable that it is one of the fastest growing crimes especially with the progression of the internet. Studies show that 27,000 people are victimized each day… which is equal to a person slandered every 3 seconds.

We all are vulnerable to this crime. We struggle to protect our identities from these criminals but it is getting harder to do so with each passing day. However, though each of us is a prospective victim, there is a much more vulnerable strain of population, and that is the college students or the so-called young people of today.

How come they are so vulnerable? Well, there is more than one answer to that question…

First off, it is all about the internet. Yes, the information highway has a lot to do with it. Number one is that college students tend to share almost all information they have about themselves. They don’t see the danger of sharing personal data to other people. Especially now with the boom of social networking sites, it has become easier for thieves to connect with these people and try to juice out information from them. Some colleges even have databases online with the data of their students. That is just downright risky.

Another thing with the internet is that some colleges even risk their students more by having their grades posted through Social Security Numbers of respective students despite that most of these universities have insufficient security on their data. When security is jeopardized, and information is shared, it just doubles up the risk of being a victim of identity theft.

Next vulnerability of students is that they don’t run out. I mean, there are always students every year in every campus, with its population even increasing. Aside from that, some colleges have already allowed credit card companies to enter the campuses and offer students their products. Though companies have swarmed to colleges years way back, it has become a riskier thing as the world has progressed a lot and thieves have become more cunning and wiser.

Of course students tend to accept almost every offer proposed to them. Students want their own cards and their own credit line. But then, they tend to be careless with it and pick everything offered to them, enhancing their risk as victims.

Another thing with the students is they often don’t dispose papers well. When disposing documents of certain information, especially personal information, one must use cross-cutter shredders as some thieves go as far as the dumpster to look for documents.

Last vulnerability is their tendency to “not care” about it. Truly, college has given these young people new found freedom. And they tend to ignore the risk of identity theft given that they can do as they please. Well of course some parents may have warned their children, but the kids will just reason out that their parents worry too much. Well, it’s just that these students have too much in their heads already and won’t mind about it.

Identity theft protection is a must especially to these vulnerable young people. They may have credit cards, why not? But make sure to do some regular identity theft check of getting credit reports.