Only half of Canadians take steps to protect against identity theft

While 71% of Canadians are aware of the impact identity theft can have on their personal finances, including their credit scores, only 53% are taking steps to protect themselves, including managing social media account settings, finds a survey by Capital One.

Read: Canadians more confident about their financial futures: Mackenzie survey

Here are some additional findings.

Millennials are more aware of the impact of identity theft when compared to baby boomers.
Most Canadians protect themselves against fraud by not sharing their P.I.N. (88%) or regularly monitoring online banking and credit card accounts (76%).
Only a small number of Canadians have enabled transactional push notifications on their mobile device (20%) or regularly check their credit report (21%).
71% say their credit score would be impacted if they became a victim of identity theft, yet only 12% use a credit score monitoring tool.
39% know what their credit score is and 27% have a good understanding of how it’s calculated.

Tips to protect against fraud

Take advantage of the features your credit card offers. Many credit cards have opt-in fraud detection features, like two-way fraud alerts and purchase notifications.
Report fraud immediately. Tell investors to call their banks to report a lost wallet or card. Many banks have measures in place to protect your account.
Monitor your credit score. Staying on top of your financial activity is key. A client should know if someone tries to open a new loan account in his name, or worse—has used his information to default on a loan. Leverage free credit monitoring tools.

About the survey: Responses were collected from 1,514 randomly selected Canadian adults aged 18+ who were Angus Reid Forum panelists from Feb. 2 to Feb. 4, 2018. The margin of error is +/- 2.5%, 19 times out of 20.

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