It's that time. Shopping and spending are at their peak for the year and that puts identity thieves on high alert. While many consumers are aware of the threat to their personal proprietary information, businesses often are not.
With an increasing number of businesses operating online in addition to traditional means, it is critical that consumers and business owners know how to protect themselves from identity theft and fraud. Fraud not only can ruin the holiday shopping experience, it can have disastrous and long-lasting effects for a business long after the holidays have passed. Even if your company doesn't conduct retail business online, it is important to protect your private business information and data. December is Identity Theft Prevention and Awareness Month, so take these additional precautions to safeguard your confidential information:
- Limit what you carry. When you go out, take only the identification, and business credit or debit cards you need.
- Lock your financial documents and records in a safe place, such as a safe or locked file cabinet that only you can access.
- Before you share information with vendors, ask why they need it, how they will safeguard it, and the consequences of not sharing.
- Protect your company documents. Shred receipts, credit applications and offers, insurance forms, checks, bank statements, expired charge cards and similar documents when you don't need them any longer.
- Install anti-virus software, anti-spyware software and a firewall on all company computers. Set your preference to update these protections often.
- Don't open files, click on links, or download programs sent by strangers. Opening a file from someone you don't know could expose your system to a computer virus or spyware that captures your passwords or other information you type.
- Before you send your business information via your laptop or smartphone over a public wireless network in a public place, see if your information will be protected. If you use an encrypted website, it protects only the information you send to and from that site. If you use a secure wireless network, all the information you send on that network is protected.
- Keep financial information on your laptop only when necessary. Don't use an automatic login feature that saves your user name and password, and always log off when you're finished.
For more extensive information on privacy and identity protection, visit FTC.gov and look for the "Tips & Advice" tab. If you’re interested in fraud prevention services for your business that includes theft resolution and account monitoring services, Arvest offers ACH Fraud Block and ChecXchange® with some of its business services. To learn more, visit Arvest.com and select Fraud Prevention under the "Business" tab.