Leave all cards with Social Security Numbers on them at home or in your hotel safe. If necessary, carry your personal documents in a different pocket then your wallet. It goes without saying, never leave your wallet or purse unattended even for a second.

Thieves have been known to target women with loose, dangling purses. Lost out-of-towners or foreigners carrying a lot of cash, and parents distracted by their kids or babies, so stay alert. Leave bills at home- Travelers often take advantage of quiet evenings and downtime in hotels to catch up with bookkeeping and paying bills.

Many vacationers and business travelers forget that many people have access to your hotel room. Victims have reported that account information and check information has been stolen from hotel rooms. Leave your bills at home. You are on vacation anyway, save the number crunching for your return.

Using rental computers- If you are using Kinko's computer rentals and other cyber cafe computers while on the vacation, it is essential that you protect your personal/financial/password information. At several Kinko's in the New York City area, a cyber-scammer installed software that recorded the keystroke information gathered from people using the computer rentals and was able to obtain the personal information of 450 people.

Avoid performing any financial transactions or accessing personal information on rented computers. If you need to access and use a password protected account from a rental computer you should cut and paste the password from a word document where the password is in the middle of random characters. This can make keystroke recording difficult for scammers.

These are just a few tips we recommend to keep your identity safe when travelling. A vacation should be a relaxing time but do not be lazy in protecting yourself from identity thieves. Remember according to the FTC, 52% of identity theft victims detected fraudulent activity by reviewing their own credit reports.

Purchasing a credit report and credit monitoring services from a reputable credit reporting company, is a great way to keep an eye on your credit and quickly identify and address any fraudulent charges.

For more information on identity theft and credit reporting visit us at My Private Credit