Every two seconds there’s a victim of identity theft in this country. Let Westport Federal Credit Union help protect your identity with these six recommendations.

Watch Your Wallet – Carry only what you need and never carry things like your social security number, birth certificate, account numbers or passwords and PINs.

Check your Credit Report – You are able to obtain a free credit report from all three credit bureaus on a yearly basis. This ensures accounts are not opened without your knowledge.

Update Your Address – Statements, credit card offers, tax info, replacement debit cards, and so much more are sent to the address you have listed on an account. If you forget to update your address, you could be sending sensitive information to a potential fraud.

Shred Everything – People will dig through trash to find information that may benefit them. Statements, expired cards and more should all be shredded.

Passwords – Passwords are what protect your devices. When creating passwords, be sure to use capital and lower case letters, numbers, and symbols. Also, try and use different passwords that way if a password gets compromised, you don’t have to worry about other websites that that password is used for.

Internet Precautions – Never ever open emails from unknown senders as they may have viruses. Also, never join an unknown Wi-Fi connection, if you did you would be sharing a lot of personal information with them.