[onetimeonly]

Actually my biggest lesson about identity theft is that most people just don't need to worry. The negative effect of identity theft in 9999/1000 cases is just the inconvenience of correcting the mistakes by informing various institutions about it. In the last 5 years or so, banks have got very good at clearing up the mess fast.

You need to assess the risk, taking into account the very low probability of having your identity stolen and the fairly low inconvenience, against the time and effort it takes to take protective measures. Don't live in fear of it.

That said, the single best way to protect yourself from random ID theft is to use a decent bank with good fraud protection. In the UK, Barclays and HSBC are very good, Natwest and Halifax are very bad. Citibank is a bad US one.

[driverdan]

This isn't true at all. You generally don't have to worry about credit card theft, you're not liable. ID theft is completely different.

If someone steals your ID and drains your bank account it's going to be much harder and more time consuming to get your money back. If someone opens credit cards under your ID it will be easier to correct than losing your bank account but can still be very time consuming. Often people discover the issue when they're applying for new credit, such as a mortgage. Correcting your credit issues can take months to resolve. They could lose a house they're trying to buy if they don't get approved.

[onetimeonly]

Well, I just disagree. My experience is that recovering your bank account after fraud is trivial. Fixing fraudulently obtained credit takes longer, but basically just involves going through a formal process with credit reference agencies and lenders. If you want to protect against this, you can get a credit record protection service from any of the major credit agencies, where they alert you if there is any activity on your credit record s you can fix it.

edit: nobody should be so unaware of their own credit record that they lose a house sale because of undiscovered fraud. Keeping on top of it is very cheap and as simple as registering on a website (UK example: https://www.creditexpert.co.uk)

[triplesec]

I had a friend who was id hacked. not nice, and citibank was really bad at helping him. Don't expect them to be on your side, any of the big nasties.

and don't put your damn personal information on facebook!