Target, Snapchat… Identity theft has been in the news a lot lately. Sure, you may have thought the movie Identity Thief was funny but in real life identity theft is a big headache.  It’s a problem that isn’t going away.  In fact, it’s only getting worse.

According to the Identity Theft Resource Center 2013 saw a 30% increase in data breaches over 2012.  There were over 600 breaches exposing nearly 58 million records.  The FTC estimates identity theft happens every three seconds.  Scary stuff.

Until Target’s data breach late last year I hadn’t given much thought to protecting my identity.  I did all the common sense stuff everyone says you should do (create strong passwords, destroy sensitive documents before disposing them, avoid clicking on links in emails from people you don’t know, etc.) but that’s about as far as I had taken it.

Last night my wife and I got serious and made the decision to purchase identity theft insurance for our family.  We insure our home, our vehicles, our life… I guess our identity is the next logical step.  It really isn’t that expensive either.

We went with Zander Insurance and for less than $13 a month our entire family is covered.  That’s up to a million dollars in expense protection.  The thing I like most about the coverage is they handle all the work of restoring our credit if something were to happen.  Some reports I saw say that it takes 6 months and 200 hours of work to recover from identity theft.  Sounds like plenty of headaches, sleepless nights, and frustration that I don’t need.

This post isn’t meant to be a ringing endorsement or commercial for Zander Insurance.  There are plenty of resources out there.  Some that cost and some that are free.  Hopefully I have made you think about better protecting yourself from identity theft.

Take time to educate yourself.  Be vigilant.  At the very least get a free copy of your credit report.  A little time spent reviewing it now might save you a lot of time later.

What are you doing to protect your identity?