In Part 8 of Improving Credit Scores, we discuss the critical aspects of how to prevent and discourage Identity Theft with the ultimate aim of effective Credit Repair, centric to helping you ensure that you know and conduct the best practices in online banking and online financial transactions. This should be especially useful for you should you find sudden and drastic drops in your credit scores reflected in your Credit Report.

If you wish to safeguard yourself from identity theft, always remember to keep the following good habits to ensure best practices in both online and offline banking. Check out the following.

There are countless fly by night merchants or internet merchants both in their physical or cyber presence and you need to fully ensure that the transaction is safe and the merchant is authentic. Check out the Better Business Bureau as well. Read their privacy policy and for online merchants, when you log in to transaction, you will probably have a sense of whether the cyber merchant uses encryption technology to ensure safe transaction purposes.

With computer ease of use nowadays, even with all computer precautions, you need to avoid providing private information through email or your computer. Be extra cautious if you get an email from your bank asking you to verify your information by clicking on a link - this is a popular online scam which online scammers are out to trick you into giving them your personal details thereby stealing your identity to transact at your bank or worse still, sell your personal details to criminal financial syndicates. If you must provide information, personally check with your bank to find out if there is a request sent to you to update your particulars. In any case, use an alternative communication mode to verify the authenticity of your online requests which you receive.

If you are an avid user of online or internet banking, always ensure that you have a good firewall and antivirus system installed. Take a course in safe computing if you are new to online transactions, or approach your bank officer for advice on maintaining online banking best practices. If there is one thing you need to do after you log out of your internet banking platform is to clear the cache. Never log into your online banking platform at cybercaf�s, use public internet networks or borrowed laptops for your personal online financial and banking transactions. Cyber identity thieves are omnipresent.

Online banking is very personal and should be kept that way. Whenever you log into your online banking accounts, ensure that no one has privy to your transactions, your accounts and most of all your passwords. Never give away your passwords to anyone inclusive of your spouse. Also, do not commit the mistake of storing your account numbers and passwords in your laptop or computer where others can have easy access to.

Remember that you can never be too safe with your online transactions, so take heed and safeguard yourself against online identity thieves.

For more good reads on Credit Repair and Identity Theft Prevention, visit my site.