Some Impacts of Identity Theft

Being a victim of identity theft can have a huge impact on your personal life. Most victims of identity thieves find the experience both frightening and frustrating. No matter how the theft occurred, online or in the real world, it is not something that people can just deal with and move on. Identity theft sometimes affects its victims for years after the crime has been committed.

Having to deal with the after effect of identity loss, years after their identity was stolen, adds to the anger and frustration that such victims feel. Victims of identity theft were first violated when their identities were stolen, but they may feel continually violated as they try to get on with their life.

One thing that victims of identity theft agree on is that getting your life back in order, after having your identity stolen, is not easy to do. Once you find your identity has been stolen, you may need to cancel all of your credit cards, change passwords to any of your accounts, place fraud alerts with the credit reporting agencies, and file a complaint with the police department, or even the FBI. Having to take care of all of this is stressful for most people. To make matters worse, when you place a fraud alert with the credit bureaus, your ability to even use your credit becomes much more difficult. In just trying to open up a new line of credit, you can encounter many obstacles.

Recovery from identity theft can be mentally exhausting and may affect your life because of how much energy the process consumes. People who have been victims have spent hours trying to put things right. Some banks and retailers may be more cooperative with identity theft victims and correct account records without much questioning, but that is not always the case. When banks and retailers are not cooperative and considerate, the victims of identity fraud may have to spend hours, days, and possibly weeks proving who they are and that they were not responsible for what happened.

Having your identity stolen also affects the way that you view things. People who have become a victim of identity thieves often find it hard to trust other people again, because they are afraid that they might be victimized once again. For example, someone who has had their identity stolen might find it hard to use a credit card again and will only pay with cash. The lack of trust changes who you are as a person, and is one of the impacts of stolen identity that people seldom think about.