Did you know...? Digital Citizenship: Identity Theft

Identity theft is an ongoing issue. Every Spring you will hear reports being made about the risk of having your taxes filed by another individual. I have a family member who just last year was notified that there was an unemployment claim made with their name and social security number. The process is daunting and complex with the numerous scams out there and amount of companies who have your information. If you suspect or discover that your identity has been in fact stolen, you have a lot of work ahead of you.

According to identitytheft.gov, you must do the following:

1. Call the fraud departments at the companies you think it occurred at.
2. Change your pins, usernames, and passwords.
3. Maybe even close or freeze those accounts!
4. Then place a fraud alert on your credit reports, this will last 90 days and is FREE. This will make it harder for accounts to be opened under your name and information. Also, this can be renewed after 90 days.
5. Create an account with the Federal Trade Commission and make a claim for Identity Theft!
6. Next, you may want to consider filing a police report about the incident.
7. After all of this, you now have to close the fake accounts opened, remove false purchases, stop possible debt collectors (for debt you do not really have), clear any criminal charges falsely in your name, and notifying and checking every other account or office associated with your name!

When we think of identity theft, we often only think about it impacting adults but here is the thing... children/students private information is out there and they also can have their identity stolen!

There was an identity theft protection scan completed on forty thousand children and adults. Of those, ten percent of the children had their social security number used by another person. This is in comparison to .2 percent of the adults in the scan! Based off this information, it would seem that children actually have a high risk. Yet, parents and guardians do not think of children being susceptible to identity theft and do not routinely check their child's information. Also, unused social security numbers can be used by scammers and illegal immigrants since their is not name or birth date associated with it. Lastly, children's information is held in school databases and testing databases. If one of those were to be hacked, the thief would have access to thousands of identities!

As a future social studies educator, I believe that this fits right in with the course content and goals. I want my students to be active participants in our communities, government, and fulfill their civic duties of their citizenship. In today's day and age, in order to due so requires some sort of technology! If you want to join and organization, club, check personal information, gain important information about how to do various things.. then the internet is essential! As students learn about their civic duties, law and order, current events, and etc... they can be taught the elements and safety of Digital Citizenship!