Identity theft can impact any at any time. It is easy for someone to get your personal information and use it to make purchases you did not authorize. This could impact your credit score if you are not protecting yourself from identity theft. There are two things to do to protect yourself from an identity theft crime.

The first thing to do to protect yourself from identity theft is to check your credit score. This is one of the best ways to know if you have been a victim of identity theft. Checking your credit score often with online tools like Credit Karma is a good habit to have. You will be able to identify any discrepancies on your accounts if you’ve been a victim of identity theft. Most of the time, people do not notice if their personal information has been stolen because a credit card that they do not use often has been compromised. Checking your credit score will give you insight if a card you don’t use has a balance. Your score could be impacted if this charge is not paid and you have an outstanding balance. You will want to contact your bank as soon as you see a suspicious purchase, so it does not impact your score.

A second way to protect yourself from identity theft is to check for discrepancies to fix your score. If you do not look at your credit often, you may have a few discrepancies on your account that are impacting your score. While noticing these early is better, fixing your score with fraudulent purchases is not too late. First, check all of your accounts for any type of suspicious purchases. If you notice one, call your bank and settle these issues. Your credit score should be adjusted once the bank has concluded its research. Your credit card company will help you to fix the problem, but they will not check your account for you to notice these issues. This is something you need to take control of.