Home security for your Mailbox
With the holiday season upon us many persons are receiving in the mail a lot of different offers for goods and services requiring that they to spend their money. For many persons that will be about all the mail they receive in their mailbox outside of their regular bills, until the season has passed.
In many cases when you receive mail in your mailbox your personal information is usually a part of what is sent. This is never a good situation as most mailboxes used by homeowners are easily broken into. This presents the ideal situation for identity thieves, as many of us do not even consider our mailboxes when we think about home and personal security. Every day we receive tons of mail and this is a haven for those identity thieves that will continue to be so until we address the problem.
There are plenty of mailbox designs around but many of them have been around for over fifty years and do not stop anyone from gaining access to our mail. In fact with some mailboxes all an identity thief has to do is just reach inside the mailbox with his hand and pull out the mail. All these boxes do is to receive our mail, but they do not protect it in any way.
As homeowners many of us do not even think about how we are providing the perfect Christmas gift for identity thieves. We take our mail out of the mail box and go back inside our homes, unaware that an identity thief only needs a couple of pieces of our mail to get our personal information. They will then use it to gain and charge up credit cards to amounts we cannot afford and then we may find ourselves responsible for wrecking our credit.
It is therefore very important that as part of your over security plan for your home you include your mail box. You should take out your mail from the mailbox as soon as it arrives. If no one is available to take the mail form the mailbox you get a mail box that uses a padlock on it. You can also rent a post office box from your local post office or you can use a private mailbox service. Both offer a very secure delivery system. It will cost you a few dollars per year for rental fees.
If you decide to replace your mailbox you should choose one that is made from solid steel. Make sure that the top part of the mailbox is easily accessible by the mailman so that he can place the mail inside the box without much trouble. The section of the mailbox that you will use to access the mail should be of such that a key is required to open it. This will protect you from having your mail stolen and by extension identity theft. Mailboxes made of steel are virtually impossible to get into and does open easily when you use your key for access. It is important that you install your mailbox properly and keep it in good working condition.
You can find steel mailboxes at any hardware store both on the Internet and in your neighborhood. Take time to compare prices and the quality of the features of the mailbox, before you decide on the one you will buy.
If there is any sign of tampering you should have it immediately repaired. Also if you should see someone tampering with your mail box, you should write down their description and report it to the police or your local postmaster. Do not accost these persons by yourself, if at all; let the police handle the matter.
You must pay careful attention to your mail and your mailbox, as the identity thieves will be doing just that so protect yourself from them.
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