Identity theft is a broad concept. The term ‘identity theft’ has various aspects and motives such as, to steal money and account takeover, to misuse somebody’s sweet name or to cover up involvement in any crime. But the main motive behind identity theft is money and wealth.

From children to senior citizens and from rich to poor, identity thieves can target anyone at any stage of life to achieve their motive. Yet there are some potential audiences who are at constant and higher risk of identity theft.

Social media users:

Social media users are at growing risk of identity theft. Since the main motive of social media is to share information with large number of people, it has become great source of identity theft. As per August 2017, out of total Facebook users in India, 40% users are between age group of 18 to 24 years. This age group tends to share maximum personal data on social media platforms. Also, this is the age group who uses credit cards, debit cards or internet banking for the first time. This is the reason why they are less aware about digital frauds and comparatively inattentive about identity protection measures. Hence, the rate of cyber fraud is highest among social media users. Remember, identity thieves do not need every pinch of your personal details. Your basic information like, name, date of birth, hometown or mobile number is more than enough to create your fake identity.

Smart phone users:

Smart phone users are opening doors to identity thieves since most of our personal data is stored digitally. More and more people are using smart phones to pay bills or to transfer money or almost for all possible financial transactions. Also, people have tendency to use same password for all their social media accounts or banking accounts. This makes your digital identity more vulnerable as a criminal can get access to all your accounts at once! Hence, for an identity thief, smart phone users are becoming hot target.

Credit card users:

From the time when people started becoming a part of cashless economy, rate of identity theft began to increase simultaneously. Rising use of credit and debit cards made easy for identity thieves to steal and misuse financial data. Data can be compromised either by physical stealing of credit card or through other smart tricks like skimming, spoofing, cloning, etc. Also, these types of frauds take time to come into light, which ultimately benefits a fraudster.

Weak password keepers:

Weak password is a root cause of identity theft. Since most of our personal data and sensitive financial information is stored digitally, it is essential to protect our online accounts and devices with equally strong passwords. Passwords like ‘12345’ or ‘password’ or ‘qwerty’ are listed on top in the dictionary of hackers. Hence people who neglect the need of passwords or consistently use weak passwords or maintain same password for all online accounts are often targeted by identity thieves.

High net worth individuals:

The more you have to protect, the less proficiently you protect. Money and wealth are the most important factors in identity theft. Wealthy and rich people usually have number of bank accounts which make their information available through various sources. This gives multiple choices to an identity thief to compromise on their digital identity.

Senior citizens:

Senior citizens are more likely to fall victim to identity theft as this age group is usually not well familiar with technology. Identity thieves, taking advantage of this, easily manipulate and steal data from this age group. Lack of technological knowledge and digital fraud awareness makes them more vulnerable to identity theft.

Identity theft and digital fraud is unpredictable. Anyone can fall victim at any point of time. It is always better to take protective approach rather than to fall victim and later undertake measures to recover the loss.