U.S. Virgin Islands resources for personal identity theft protection

Note: These resources are specifically designed to address personal identity theft prevention and incidents of consumer identity theft. Because most state and federal identity theft and consumer protection laws are designed to protect individual consumers, businesses generally do not enjoy the same rights, protections, and potential recourse as consumers. Therefore, while helpful in addressing many issues that you may face as an individual, be aware that consumer identity theft information may not be applicable to an incident of business identity theft or fraud.

U.S. Federal Trade Commission Consumer ID theft website   (personal protection information)

Learn how to protect your personal credit

Business identity thieves often use the identity information (and credit) of the business owner or company officers to open new accounts, or as guarantors of fraudulent loans and lines of credit. In addition to taking actions to protect your business, it is also important to protect yourself as well. This section provides detailed explanations of important consumer credit protection tools that are available to help protect your personal credit from identity thieves.

Use the links below to learn what these tools are, how they work, and how to use them to help protect your personal credit.

Tools & Resources to Protect Your Personal Credit:

Review, Manage, and Protect Your U.S. Virgin Islands Business Filings

If your business does not regularly review your business filings, file your annual reports in a timely manner, or enroll in email alerts or other preventative systems that may be offered, you may unknowingly attract the unwanted attention of business identity thieves.

• Review your USVI business filings
  Contact the Office of the Lieutenant Governor - Division of Corporations and Trademarks to verify the accuracy of your business filings and confirm that your filings are up to date.

• Review your USVI business licenses
  Verify your USVI business licenses and confirm that your licenses are accurate and up to date.

Review and Protect Your Business Credit Reports

Business identity thieves can manipulate or falsify business credit records and then use these to impersonate your business, or as a part of a fraud scheme to target your business. To combat this, you should periodically review your business credit reports and the information that is being reported.

Contact the business credit reporting agencies:

Report and Correct Fraudulent U.S. Virgin Islands Business Filings

In the United States Virgin Islands, if your official business records have been fraudulently changed or updated, contact the Office of the Lieutenant Governor - Division of Corporations and Trademarks to report and correct fraudulent business records.

Please note that you should only contact the Division of Corporations and Trademarks for business identity theft incidents involving fraudulent business records.

All other types of business identity theft incidents and related fraud should be reported directly to the U.S. Virgin Islands Police Department. Also review the Business Identity Theft Victim Action List for other important steps to take.

Report Business Identity Theft to U.S. Virgin Islands Law Enforcement

In the United States Virgin Islands, if your business is a victim of business identity theft, you should report the crime to the U.S. Virgin Islands Police Department.

In the case of fraudulent business filings, the Office of the Lieutenant Governor - Division of Corporations and Trademarks may also report or escalate to law enforcement as appropriate.

Also review the Business Identity Theft Victim Action List for other important steps to take.

U.S. Virgin Islands Police Department

Website:  www.vipd.gov.vi

St. Thomas, St. John, & Water Island telephone:  (340) 715-5522 / 5516   or   (340) 714-9834

St. Croix telephone:  (340) 778-2211