What can I do if I have been the victim of identity fraud?

If you have been the victim of identity fraud and you are concerned about your financial information being misused, you may want to freeze your credit This will help prevent anyone from fraudulently obtaining credit in your name.

To request your credit is frozen, you will need to contact the three national credit reporting companies (Centrix(external link), illion(external link), and Equifax(external link)). See our consumer rights under the Credit Reporting Privacy Code [PDF, 179 KB] for more information about this process.

More generally, you may also want to:

• Contact the Police to lay a complaint, as the scam may be illegal and the scammers may be criminals who can be found and prosecuted.
• Contact IDCARE(external link), a New Zealand and Australian-based service that offers free and anonymous support and advice to victims of identity fraud.
• Talk to your Citizens' Advice Bureau to get independent, impartial advice about what else you can do and where you may be able to go to get help.

Further guidance on what you can do if you have been the victim of fraud can be found through the Consumer Protection page of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment(external link).

For more general information about scams, see the Department of Internal Affairs page on scams(external link). For information about recent online scams, see Netsafe’s page on scams(external link).