Protecting your identity is one of the most important
safeguards you can manage in this world of data exchanges. Your identity is
important to you but have you considered how valuable your identity might be to
a criminal? The total financial losses attributed to identity theft in 2013 were
$24.7 BILLION which was much higher than the identity theft losses of $13.2
BILLION in 2010. (SOURCE: U.S. Department of Justice). Identity theft crimes
are clearly on the rise. What steps can you take to protect your good name and
credit?
North Alabama Educators Credit Union has partnered with
the Member Security Center (MSC) to provide a new service that we are excited
to offer to our members. The MSC is an affordably priced identity theft
solution that has many features for our members. MSC’s Cyber Watch monitoring
service scans thousands of websites, chat rooms, forums and networks and alerts
members if their non-public information is being traded on the Internet. This
proactive approach will allow members to act early and will help them to avoid
becoming a victim of identity theft in the first place. There are three
reasonable pricing plans of $1.95 monthly, $3.95 monthly, or $12.95 monthly.
These reasonably priced retail MSC identity theft
solutions are powered by the same identity theft wholesaler that supplies
identity theft retail products for the big national brand names out there. The
difference is you don’t pay twice as much for the same level of identity theft
protection and monitoring. This is more of a member service for the credit
union members of North Alabama Educators Credit Union, not a big profit maker.
I signed up for the $3.95 monthly service on the first
day and was amazed to see the number of sex offenders within a relatively small
radius. If a registered sex offender moves near our area I will receive an
alert stating as such. If a new credit account is opened I will receive a notification
on that. There are professional resources and money coverages for costs
associated with restoring your identity should that occur. Other valuable services are available depending on the product level selected.
Members are encouraged to take a look at this MSC
Identity Theft program. If you already have an identity theft product, compare
it with the various MSC programs available. If you do not have an identity
theft program protecting your good name now, we would strongly encourage you to
consider adopting some type of managed identity theft program. Unfortunately,
the world we live in now translates to more of a “when” scenario rather than an
“if” scenario in terms of becoming an identity theft victim.
The MSC Identity Theft website has plenty of useful
resources and information to help our members make an informed decision on possible
identity theft coverage.
