In a report compiled to look into the past years habits when it comes to banking and fraud has shown a dramatic up haul in the amount of fraud victims within the United Kingdom. In the year 2007 the losses we sustained topped £535 Million - a huge 25% more than 2006. Apparently the trends for this year are looking to be similar.

Although most people within the United Kingdom are aware of the dangers of identity theft, fraud and credit card crime in general, there are still thousands of us putting glanced at banking documents and old cards in the waste paper basket and later into the dustbin without a second thought. These documents are highly valuable to criminals, who can either use the information they find to use your money or simply sell them on to other criminals so they don't have to do the leg work.

If you shred your documents and place them in the bin in pieces you dramatically lower the chance of them being useful to thieves. If you can, don't plonk a shredder bin full of destroyed documents into the bin in one pile, all a thief has to do it get their hands on it before they fall apart and they can still read al the details.

If you are getting rid of any cards, be sure you cut them up and make a break through the chip part as well as the black strip on the back. This stops the fraudsters from fixing the card and using it before it's recognised as old.

Remember to keep an eye on your finances by opening an online banking account. These are usually free to set up and most banks will have an online system where you can quickly review your balance, transfer money and see what your debits are compiled of. This makes it easy to notice if anything happens that you're either not expecting or don't recognise.