I attended a convention on the topic of computer security, and learned a great deal… One of the speakers was an FBI aide talking about identity theft, and what you can do to prevent it. Overall, his talk revolved around a few very useful hints that I will summarize here…

Only give out your Social Security Number and full legal name when it is absolutely necessary. All anyone needs to open a credit card in your name is your full legal name and your social security number; they don’t even need to use your actual address!

Add a "fraud alert" to each of the 3 credit-reporting agencies. This will cause each of the 3 credit reporting companies, (TransUnion, Experian and Equifax) to contact you before anyone is granted access to your credit history. This will allow you to intervene before someone can setup an account in your name! Even though you are not likely to ever be held liable for fraudulent charges, it could take between 6 months and 2 years to have your credit cleaned after such fraud. The speaker therefore recommended that you setup fraud alerts if you have been a victim of fraud in the past, or believe that you are in a likely situation to be a victim in the future.

The links that I have found for setting up Fraud Alerts are:

Also: see this link to "opt out" of all (or most) of the credit offers that you get in the mail every day:

Finally, this final link is to a PDF file of a Identity Theft Kit, with some similar information to that which is contained here…