This is a personal example of just how easy identity theft could be. One year ago, I moved to a new house. Our mail was forwarded and all our addresses were changed.

The same cannot be said of previous owners. Although most mail has slowly stopped coming in, we are still, after one year, receiving the American Express statement for the twice-removed owner.

The owner pays his bills online, so perhaps does not care about the statement, or realize its missing. We have, after a few months of this, even called American Express about it. They told us they would stop mailing them to us. That was more than 6 months ago. A little disturbing, considering the increased fraud risk this poses for American Express.

The point of this example: we could easily open up that mail and use the information. Credit card fraud and identity theft is just that easy. We have no way to stop receiving the mail - the ownership goes too far back for us to contact the person in question. The owner is lucky we are honest - but not all people are.

Do not make identity theft easy. Forward all your mail, and change all your addresses. Pay particular attention to the bills you pay online, and make sure those are changed too.

Image via dancerinthedark of morguefile ; Tags: mail forwarding, identity theft, credit card fraud