Identity theft is a crime that is growing at a fast pace. The effects of identity theft and penalty can be a devastating experience. To avoid getting your identity stolen, it is important to take some real vital steps.

Before you can start protecting yourself, you must first find out if you are not already a victim of this vicious crime. You best bet would be to get a free copy of your credit report in order to determine if someone is using your credit profile.

In the event that your privacy has already been tapped into, the only course of action is to contact the proper authorities. The road back from a credit profile that has be rampage by identity thieves can be a long and arduous one. That is why prevention is the key.

There is not a shortage of companies that offer identity protection services. You can use your credit card company, the credit bureaus or even a private company like Life Lock.

Another good preventative option is to use services like reverse telephone search. Many criminals nowadays have the guts to even call your home pretending to be a creditor. You should never divulge valuable info over the phone to companies that seem suspicious.

If you receive a call that you think may be from a bogus company, you can use the reverse phone lookup service to find out the information of the caller. This service even works for cell phone numbers as well as unlisted numbers.

To make sure you always have the number of anyone who calls your phone, you can turn the feature on your phone that rejects calls from anonymous callers. This feature gives you the ability to know the number of everyone who calls.

You can never have too much safety when it comes to your personal identity. The more time you spend on securing yourself, the less frustration your will endure in the future.