College students are big targets for identity thieves

Identity theft is a crime that impacts nearly everyone. From small children to the elderly, no one is immune. According to Javelin Strategy and Research, someone's identity is stolen every three seconds, and college students are increasingly becoming targets.

"There are several reasons why college students are a prime target for identify theft," said Joe Vahey, vice president and product manager at Erie Insurance. "Not only do they usually have pristine credit records but they also are exposed to many situations that can leave them unknowingly vulnerable to becoming an identity theft victim."

After this crime occurs, criminals typically attempt to open credit cards and loans using the compromised names. For this reason, financial institutions, such as short term lenders, need to be one of the first lines of defense by installing top of the line ID verification procedures to make sure people are who they say they are.

The reason why defense against this type of crime is so important is because all a criminal needs is a few pieces of a person's financial information to damage their consumer credit score, among other things, which can be extremely expensive to correct. In fact, Community Manager for Credit.com Barry Paperno says identity theft can reduce a person's score by more than 100 points - all of which may not be regained.

Fortunately, there are places consumers can receive assistance after seeing their financial situations destroyed by this type of crime. For instance, short term lending could come in handy to people struggling to cover their essential expenses while trying to correct the damage that was completed by an identity thief. This service can prove invaluable, especially for those who have seen their credit scores fall markedly.