Are you doing all you can to keep your identity safe and snug with you, instead of out gallivanting with someone else? This week, I’ve encouraged you to use a locked mailbox, shred your documents, cut off junk mail at the source and clean out your wallet — but what else can you do?

First, have you really checked out ProtectYourIDNow.org yet? The site is full of quizzes, tips and even games to help you keep a lid on your identity. Learning how to protect yourself couldn’t be easier!

A few articles from the PoorerThanYou archives might help, as well. This isn’t the first time we’ve had an Identity Theft week here on PTY! Check these out:

Jury Duty and Other Identity Theft Scams 
High Schoolers: Beware of Identity Theft 
Tips and Tricks to Get Your Identity Stolen!

David at Money Under 30 has also been covering National Protect Your Identity Week with four posts of his own:

Seven Signs You’re At-Risk for Identity Theft
Beware Credit Card Skimmers and How to Spot Them
Beware Phishing Attempts and How to Spot Them
Everything You Need to Know About Protecting Your Identity

Or, I guess you can do as my friend Sam told me on Twitter and “Be an illegal immigrant and live as a hermit in the mountains.”

If you have a “Costanza Wallet,” you know you need to clean that thing out! But even if you’ve just got a normal amount of stuff in your wallet, you’re probably carrying too much stuff in there. If you lose your wallet or it gets pick-pocketed, how much of your indentifying information is at risk?

Of course, you’ve got to carry some important stuff in there, or else what would be the point of having the wallet at all? But try to pair it down to just what you absolutely need. Clean out any receipts nightly, and if you put something in there just to use it that day, take that out at night as well.

What’s necessary for you is going to vary, but here are some guidelines for what shouldn’t be in your wallet:

Social Security Card: A locked fire-safe is the place for this, not your wallet! And really, how many times do you really need it? I’ve only used my physical SS card twice in my life: at the DMV. Don’t carry that thing around with you! If an identity thief wants to do more than just run up a balance on your credit card, your SS card is exactly what s/he needs.

Multiple Debit Cards: Debit cards are less secure than credit cards if they get stolen. Oh, I know, debit card companies will try and tell you that they’re “just as secure!” But think about it: if someone uses your debit card, that money goes straight out of your account. Then you have to file a dispute and wait for the bank to decide that the charge was fraudulent. While you’re waiting, that money is still missing from your checking account. With a credit card, you dispute before your statement ends, and you are never missing the money for the fraudulent charge. So carry just one debit card, if you need to.

Multiple Credit Cards: Yeah, you shouldn’t carry more than one of these, either. Chances are if you have multiple credit cards, you have a “main” one and then others for very specific purposes. Don’t carry those others unless you’re going out to do something that requires one of those cards. In that case, see if you can leave the regular card at home so that you’re still just carrying one credit card.

Also, scan every card in your wallet, back and front. This way, you’ll know what to report missing if you lose the wallet, and you’ll have the numbers from the backs of your cards that you’re supposed to call.

Bonus: What should you always have in your wallet? Baby pictures. A study in Edinburgh showed that pictures of babies in a wallet increased the chances that it would be returned if lost. Personally, I keep pictures of my niece and nephew in mine — because they’re cute and I adore them! I’m sure you’ve got some infant relative you can use as a security system in your wallet, as well.

Yeah, the cat in the picture is Captain Moneycat, the Consumerist cat. When I saw the picture was licensed Creative Commons on Flickr, I couldn’t resist!

Do you know what identity thieves love? A paper trail! Honestly, it’s easier to steal something out of your mailbox or your trash than it is to steal your information online. In fact, in most places, only the former one is illegal! Now I’m sure you’re locking your mailbox and shredding your junk mail, but another precaution you should take is preventing “ID Theft Bait” (paper with your info on it) from ever existing.

So opt-out! Tell the direct marketers of this country that no, you don’t want a credit card offer every week or any mailings about totally awesome craft clubs! (I’m sure your craft club is awesome and not at all a scam, even though when I Googled your name I got a bunch of results that included the word “scam.”)

OptOutPrescreen.com is the site to put a stop to all of the annoying offers you get in the mail. It’ll stop all of the businesses that you don’t have a business relationship with from sending you junk mail. Hurray!

As for the businesses you do have a relationship with? Like the credit card that keeps sending your “courtesy checks” even though you never use them? Yeah, you’ll have to call each one of those directly and try to convince the customer service rep on the phone to stop sending you those. Here’s what works:

Rep: How may I help you today?

You: Uh, hi. So, you guys keep sending me courtesy checks for my account, and I don’t really want them sent anymore.

Rep: Oh, but those are [blah blah blah about why you actually want them even though you say you don’t and oh we can’t stop sending them blah blah blah]

You: Well, that’s nice and all, but I’m afraid that someone might be trying to steal my mail, which is why I signed up for paperless statements. [Technically, this is true. Or at least, you should be afraid!]

Rep: Oh, that’s terrible! Alright, we’ll stop sending those courtesy checks to you for now.

Hurray for less junk mail!

This post is a part of National Protect Your Identity Week. Be sure to check out www.ProtectYourIDNow.org and subscribe to this site to get all the ID theft prevention tips!

I don’t need to tell you that you should be shredding all of the junk mail credit card applications and everything else that has personal info on it before you throw it out. You already know it! But hey, not everyone does something just because they know they should. So, if you’re not shredding your sensitive papers before throwing them out… consider this your kick in the butt to get a cross-cut paper shredder and get shredding!

(Before I had a shredder, we lived in a house heated by a woodstove. I would burn all of my junk mail!)

How to Shred Stuff for Cheap (or Free!)

Craigslist/Freecycle: These are great services for getting free stuff anyway, and a paper shredder is a perfect example of something you can get for free or cheap on one of these services. In fact, there was a free paper shredder listed just this Saturday on my local Freecycle mailing list. So you’ve go no reason not to look there!

Ask a Friend: In college, whenever I would off-handedly mention that I needed to buy a paper shredder, a friend of mine would just offer to let me use his. I think he underestimated the vast pile of stuff I had saved up to shred! But still, why not take advantage of such an offer while it’s on the table? If you feel like you’re taking advantage of your friend, just use their shredder to shred your most threatening documents.

Shredding Events: Keep your sensitive papers for shredding in a secure place (away from the prying eyes of roommates and dubious guests-of-roommates), and find out when there’s going to be a free, public shredding event in your area to take it all to. Your best friend in finding one of these events is Google! Search for “[your city] shredding event” and see what comes up. You can also check the Shred-It website to see if that particular company is sponsoring an event near you soon.

Ask for One: I got my shredder as a Christmas present from my brother and his fiancée. My family has gotten pretty used to the fact that I ask for super-practical things during the holidays! But hey, my brother was able to buy the shredder with his employee discount and I was more than happy to receive it!

Just Buy One: None of the above working for ya? Don’t be a tool — go buy a shredder* and start using it. Yeah, it’s that important.

This post is a part of National Protect Your Identity Week. Be sure to check out www.ProtectYourIDNow.org and subscribe to this site to get all the ID theft prevention tips!

*Affiliate link — I get like 4% if you decide to buy the shredder and it doesn’t cost you anything more. This is not the shredder I have, but it has good reviews for the price range. The shredder I have is not available online.

If your mailbox looks like this:

Instead of looking like this:

Then go find one of these when you want to send mail out:

All manatee and R2D2 mailboxes aside, I’m not joking. Do you know what thieves call those red flags like the one on the manatee mailbox? They call those “Steal Me flags.” To a thief, that flag sticking up in the air means “there’s something in here, and it’s probably a check or some other piece of information useful for identity theft.”

Only send your mail out from locked outgoing mail boxes, or the big blue boxes that thieves can’t reach into.

This post is a part of National Protect Your Identity Week. Be sure to check out www.ProtectYourIDNow.org and subscribe to this site to get all the ID theft prevention tips!