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More than likely, you already know to watch for fraudulent emails and phone calls from identity thieves. These criminals have targeted home phones and inboxes for years, but now they have a new weapon—text messages. An increasingly popular form of identity theft, text message credit fraud occurs when a victim is duped by an SMS message into providing sensitive information. Read on to learn if you’re at risk for text message identity theft.
Methods
As with other types of identity theft, text message credit fraud can take a number of different forms. If a thief gets a hold of your cell phone number, he can use any of the following methods to steal sensitive personal information.
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Text spyware. Many fraudulent text messages come with spyware that will corrupt the programming of your phone and/or retrieve information from your phone’s memory. These programs will then send the information you have stored in your contacts, calendar, etc. to the identity thief.
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Message solicitation. The text message appears to be from a legitimate financial institution or other company and asks you to provide specific information, such as an account number or your Social Security Number, in order to resolve some problem. For example, the message may say there was a discrepancy with your account as a pretext to deceive you into revealing your information. The message will ask you to text back with the relevant information in order to “reactivate” your account or to avoid incurring fees.
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Phone solicitation. The text message asks you to call a number in order to confirm details of your account or to resolve an issue. An identity thief then tricks you into revealing personal information over the phone.
What to Do
The companies you deal with should not send you unsolicited text messages. Unless you’ve signed up for text message alerts from a company, you should be suspicious of any texts you receive claiming to be from financial institutions, utility companies, etc. If you do receive a message of this nature, delete it immediately. If your phone stores text messages after you delete them, make sure you remove the message from your phone completely. Do not respond and do not call any numbers listed in the message. If you have concerns about your account, credit card, etc., contact the number listed on the back of your card or on your creditor’s official website. When you contact them about your account, you might also want to notify them of the fraudulent text messages.
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