Everything you NEED to know about Identity Theft

News stories continue to appear about fraud committed with stolen personal information. Why is this so important? In today's information era, it is quite simply easy to have your identity stolen. As your credit union, committed to your financial safety, we feel you need to have the latest information to keep your self and your accounts safe.

Remember Hawthorne will NEVER ask for your personal information, account number, PIN, or any sensitive account information via email. If you receive an e-mail that claims to be from Hawthorne and asks for your account information- you should consider it to be a fraudulent attempt to obtain your personal account data for an illegal purpose and you should not follow the instructions in the e-mail. If you are confused or would like to verify the request, simply call 630-369-4070, 800-848-1697 (outside IL).


Some tips to help you REDUCE YOUR VULNERABILITY are listed below.

• Do not sign the back of your credit cards. Instead, put "PHOTO ID REQUIRED".


• When you are writing checks to pay on your credit card accounts, DO NOT put the complete account number on the "For" line. Instead, just put the last four numbers. The credit card company knows the rest of the number, and anyone who might be handling your check as it passes through all the check processing channels won't have access to it.


• Put your work phone # on your checks instead of your home phone. If you have a PO Box use that instead of your home address. If you do not have a PO Box, use your work address. Never have your SS# printed on your checks. You can add it if it is necessary. But if you have it printed, anyone can get it.


• Place the contents of your wallet on a photocopy machine. Do both sides of each license, credit card, etc. You will know what you had in your wallet and all of the account numbers and phone numbers to call and cancel in case your wallet is stolen. We've all heard horror stories about fraud that's committed on us in stealing a name, address, Social Security number, credit cards. But above all- put these photocopies in a safe place!


• Never give your account numbers or Personal Identification Numbers (PIN) to someone who contacts you. The Credit Union (and most other financial institutions) will NEVER ask for your account information or PIN numbers in an email.


• Shred anything with your Social Security Number, birth date, or account number and all credit offers.


• Don’t carry your Social Security card, extra credit cards, passport or birth certificate in your purse or wallet if not absolutely necessary.


• Reconcile your accounts immediately, and challenge any purchases that you don’t remember.


• Cancel lost credit cards immediately. However, the key is having the toll free numbers and your card numbers handy so you know whom to call. Keep a separate list where you can find it quickly and easily.


• Report it to the Credit Union if your checkbook is stolen.


• File a police report immediately in the jurisdiction where your purse or wallet was stolen. This proves to credit providers you were diligent, and it is a first step toward an investigation if one is required.


• If you believe your Social Security number has been compromised, call the Social Security Administration’s fraud line to report it.


• Contact credit-reporting agencies. This is perhaps the most important and least discussed step. Call the three national credit-reporting agencies immediately and ask them to place a fraud alert on your name and Social Security number. With an alert in place, any company checking your credit knows your information was stolen and they must contact you by phone to authorize new credit.

To Shred or Not to Shred - That is the Question!

Shred It or Regret It

It’s rampant. It's evil. It's coming to a town near you. It's IDENTITY THEFT.

Identity thieves may not exactly steal your life, or your home, but they can steal your money and make life a nightmare for you for a long time. According to the Identity Theft Resource Center, identity theft is American's fastest growing crime and over 7 million people per year are victims of this crime.

I found getting ready for Shred-It Day this weekend to be particularly draining. It probably had to do with the arduous task of sifting through mounds of paper in our file cabinets. Cleaning out our files was our Friday night project (are we exciting, or what)! While my husband complained about having to go through all the files, I asked him to keep in mind the amount of time I had spent over the years, doing all of the filing.

It was hard to figure out what to keep and what to purge. Just as we cleaned out one file cabinet, I tackled another only to be met with another pile of papers to sort through.

We had to weigh out what to should keep for tax purposes, what I want to keep for sentimental reasons and what we simply don’t need. After a couple of hours be were done, and were getting rid of at least 75% of what was in our filing cabinets. I felt like a weight had been had been lifted off my shoulders.

Let The Shredding Begin

On Saturday morning it was so simple. I gave the shredding company my boxes of papers and all of those personal records were gone, saving me hours of time standing in front of our home shredder to avoid the risk of becoming a victim of identity theft.

Not shredding all of our personal documents is not a risk I am willing to take. The average victim of identity theft will spend over 600 hours and $1,400 dollars of their money clearing their name after an identity thief strikes.

Below are a few easy things that you can do to help reduce the risk of having your identity stolen.

• Shred shred shred. Buy a good cross-cut shredder, and get the most heavy duty one you can afford. Be sure it will take staples and credit cards, as well as several sheets of paper at once. Shred anything with your name, address, and of course, any account numbers on it. It only takes a minute and it's worth it.


• Mail your outgoing letters and bills from the Post Office rather than your home. I know it sounds annoying, but when that little red flag is up indicating that you have outgoing mail for the postman to collect, it's also a sign for thieves to nab your mail, which often contains checks. The thieves "wash" the checks of all ink except for your signature, then poof they have a blank check, signed by you to write to whomever they want.


• Protect your Social Security Number and credit card information. There are only about a ton of email and phone scams out there these days, so don't be fooled. NEVER give personal information over the phone or in an email and, don't click through on any emails asking you to "verify your account information" or warning you that your Ebay or PayPal account has been compromised! It's just a scam to get you to input your personal information to a bogus site that will collect it and use it for fraudulent purposes.

Taking these simple steps will help reduce your risk, limit your exposure and avoid the nightmare of identity theft.

Go paperless for safer banking

I did it. I finally went paperless. I’ve been using personal finance software for several years, and paying my bills online for just as long. But paper statements from my financial institutions and credit card companies were afterthoughts. In fact, I usually thought of them only when cursing the clutter they caused and the storage space they demanded. It was not convenience or the desire to simplify that finally led me to the switch. It was security.

You and your money are more at risk if you receive paper statements than if you go 100% electronic. Here's what you need to know to go paperless.

Identity theft experts have been telling us for years that sending sensitive financial documents through the mail is a bad idea. Paper account statements and credit card bills often give mail thieves all the information they need to take over your finances.

You could lessen the danger by buying a locking mailbox and depositing outgoing mail at the post office. But you can really limit the risk by going paperless.

People who bank entirely online, using Online Banking, BillPayer and paperless statements, more commonly referred to at Hawthorne, as eStatements, reduce their chances of becoming identity theft victims by about 20%, according to researcher James Van Dyke.

If you’re tempted to follow my lead - here’s what you need to do:

Increase security on your computer. Anyone cruising the Internet should have a good firewall and software to combat pop-ups, spyware and viruses. If your financial life is on your computer, then you need to be particularly diligent about making sure you have protections in place and update the security programs regularly.

Monitor your accounts. Most online security experts recommend checking your accounts at least weekly, and I monitor mine twice a week. One easy way to stay on top of your accounts is by downloading your transactions into a personal finance software like Quicken. This financial program makes the process painless and fast, allowing you to see exactly what’s going on in your accounts.

Don’t get hooked by phishing scams. The biggest risk to your financial records may be your own gullibility. Surveys by Gartner research found 5% of the adults they surveyed had revealed personal financial information, such as account numbers and passwords, in response to e-mails “alerting” them of a problem or an update to one of their financial accounts. To find out more about how to recognize and avoid these scams, click here.

At Hawthorne we always encourage our members to take the necessary security precautions by enrolling in eStatements. You can also save time and money by taking advantage of our other online banking products. At Hawthorne Credit Union you can view your accounts online with Online Banking and pay your bills online with BillPayer .

By offering these free services as part of our first-class Online Package, we allow you to quickly and easily pay all your bills and manage your finances online. No more stamps, envelopes, check writing, or lost mail!

Stop by our Naperville branch on Saturday, May 19 from 10 a.m. to noon and bring two bankers boxes full of old documents for free shredding (bring cancelled checks, old bank statements, credit card offers, old tax documents, etc.) and attend our Free Identity Theft seminar. We're also giving away a free document shredder, so stop in and enter.