Shredding important papers.

@bkfuels (1603)
Canada
February 13, 2007 9:48pm CST
Do you put stuff through a shredder before throwing it in the garbage. Did you know that statistically when someone has used your credit card on the internet only 1in 10 chance they got it from the internet they usually get the information out of your garbage.
4 people like this
11 responses
• United States
14 Feb 07
Yes, I don't take that practice lightly either. I have a personal paper shredder in my office room and it helps a lot, especially against Identity theft. I think it saves my financial life every time I use it so that a random person garbage surfing won't happen to find some information that could put a black hole in my financial workings. Also, it helps prevent people from selling your information on the internet. What I mean by that is that if someone happened to find your information dumpster diving, they could go sell that info to a big scam business online, who would inturn sell it to even more people, making a huge chain of people that gain money off of your credit card. This will max it out it in record time. That is the wonder a simple paper shreeder can prevent.
@bkfuels (1603)
• Canada
14 Feb 07
I really think everyone should do this.I was throwing things out willy nilly until someone told me that was crazy.
1 person likes this
• Ireland
14 Feb 07
I have heard so many times about people going through rubbish looking for personal information on others. I shred everyting and I wouldn't even dream of throwing out an envelope with my name on it. If there are some things that won't go through my shreddar, then I cut them into tiny pieces.
2 people like this
• United States
14 Feb 07
I shred all important papers with anything personal on it. ID theft is very big, and very scary. They seem to get it all kinds of ways nowadays.
1 person likes this
@tammyr (5946)
• Etowah, Tennessee
14 Feb 07
I do not have a shredder at the time, but I do burn all my papers that have anything on them I do not want others to see. I am getting a shredder soon, I just am waiting on a really good sale on a good one, the last one I had did not last long, and would like something better.
1 person likes this
@EdwardF (431)
• United States
14 Feb 07
I shred anything with any personal information, including my address. I have for about 5 years. I'm not taking the chance of having my identity or credit cards used by someone else. . your friend
@1983tyler (507)
• United States
14 Feb 07
I have a personal shredder at home and I try to put all compromising papers thru the shredder before putting them in the trash. Sometimes my husband just throws things out before I can get to them. My husband understands the importance of shredding, but he gets somewhat lazy about putting things thru the shredder because that means that the shredder has to be emptied.
1 person likes this
@ondo1015 (1884)
• Philippines
18 Feb 07
I don't have credit cards but I have Smart money card, an affoliate of Master Card. But there is a little amount in it, no one can steal it because we instantly transfer it to loading system for cellphone.
@CatVegas (709)
• United States
17 Feb 07
We have a cross shredder....I have a area that I put all my papers to be shredder and then one day I sit and do all of them. We have to many people who are dumpster divers and with so many people getting there ID taken we don't take a chance on ours. I even black out any medical bottles with our information on them as you never know who might use even our address for a fake ID...
@freesoul (3021)
• Egypt
14 Feb 07
I don't have a shredder but i make sure to destroy completely any document with personal (or even not too personal) info before throwing it to garbage.. i even burn some papers to be sure that it can't be recovered.. not that I'm in espionage cycle or anything but sometimes it's better to be safe than sorry :)
1 person likes this
@tictac714 (975)
• United States
14 Feb 07
I don't have a shredder but I do rip up all my stuff when I throw it away
@callarse1 (4783)
• United States
14 Feb 07
I am not sure about the statistics, but trash is public domain so anyone can search through it. Therefore, our home has a personal shredder (cross shredder) and we shred credit applications, mail labels, etc. I don't want people to use all that and to know about all that. I think it is better to shred important papers. Pablo