What are red flags?
According to the FTC, red flags are “potential patterns, practices, or specific activities indicating the possibility of identity theft.” These could include alerts, notifications or warnings from a credit reporting company, suspicious documents or documents that don’t match the person, suspicious personal identifying information like an altered ID, or suspicious account activity. When identifying red flags, consider the nature of your business and the type of identity theft to which you might be vulnerable. Most veterinary practices are low risk businesses. Even so, compliance is required. Establish a Red Flags Program To comply with the Red Flags Rule, veterinarians are required to develop a written “red flags program” to prevent, detect, and minimize the damage from identity theft. There are four basic steps to designing a program to comply with the Rule: Identify likely red flags common to your business and develop a written program to detect red flags in your day-to-day operations
