Professionals within the elder law community are becoming increasingly concerned about the burgeoning problem of elder financial abuse. The MetLife Mature Market Institute tells us that approximately $3 billion is lost each year to financial abusers, and instances of this abuse appear to be on the rise.
In the age of the Internet there is a whole new set of opportunities for the dregs of society who would target our nation’s seniors. Identity theft is very common these days and it is important to take steps to protect yourself. When you are creating passwords for your online accounts you should take the endeavor very seriously and use somewhat complex combinations.
These can include special characters in some cases, some capital and some lowercase characters, and a combination of letters and numbers. You also want to avoid using the same password for all of your accounts so they would not all be vulnerable if someone was to be able to hack into one of them.
You can also engage the services of a company that monitors the use of your identity so that you would be immediately notified if your identity was being used by a criminal.
Internet predation is just one of the dangers that seniors face; elder financial abuse can rear its ugly head in other ways as well. The good news is that there are some things that can be done legally to protect yourself as you reach an advanced age and become more vulnerable to identity thieves, scam artists and con men.
The best way to be prepared for all of the eventualities of aging is to plan ahead carefully with the benefit of expert advice. Should you be interested in devising a cogent plan for the future, take action right now to arrange for a consultation with a licensed and experienced central New Jersey elder law attorney.
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