Your Identity Portfolio Can Make or Break You

— -- No matter how good or lucky the investor, no one beats the market 100 percent of the time—unless, of course, you are Bobby Axelrod, Showtime's Billions mega-investor. There is, however, an investment portfolio that is somewhat more predictable. It works along similar lines, but it is possible to exercise significantly more control over it than equities. I’m talking about your identity portfolio.

I’ve written elsewhere about your credit portfolio, which can be a wealth-builder or a weapon of individual destruction depending upon how much time and effort you invest in building, nurturing, managing and protecting it.

Most people know that having bad or good credit can mean the difference between buying a bigger, better home, getting a low monthly payment on a new car, and even whether or not you get a job. No doubt that last fact comes as a surprise for many, but it is a real issue — even though a growing number of states limit utilization of credit reports as part of a job interview, many employers will, with permission, review an applicant’s credit history in order to evaluate his or her trustworthiness and employability.

Your identity portfolio is arguably more important than your credit portfolio because if it takes a hit — and at some point in your life it most likely will — so does your credit for at least as long as it takes to sort things out with whatever agencies and institutions are involved in the particular way you were defrauded.

More From Credit.com: What Is a Good Credit Score?

Ask those who have experienced attacks on their identity — and with that their credit-worthiness — when they were, for example, in the middle of making a major purchase like a home or car: identity-related crimes are a game-changer and the fallout can be pretty dire.

What’s in a Name?

I’ll leave the poetry to Shakespeare, but when it comes to your identity portfolio, your name and the cloud of facts that tie that name specifically to you is pretty much the whole enchilada. All of our material facts and assets are tied to a name — your credit accounts, your phone, your social media, your home, your car, your debt.

With an endless parade of major data wipeouts in our wake, Social Security numbers — the skeleton key to our lives — can be purchased on the information black market by the bushel. It is a bad bet to assume your Social Security number isn’t already “out there.” Indeed, a major reason why more folks haven’t yet become victims of identity-related crimes is because there simply aren’t enough scam artists in the world to make bank on all the information that has been hijacked from tens of thousands of databases — not to mention that which is willingly flung out there daily on social networking sites.

The big difference between your stock portfolio and your identity portfolio, however, is that you really do have some control with your data. While there is no way to stop a scam artist from targeting you, the goal is to own your name, and, as much as possible, to safeguard it, making sure no one else ever does.

You’re Going to Get Got

Unfortunately, that’s much easier said than done. With more than 1 billion records already exposed through mega breaches and daily security lapses, there’s just no telling who has access to the kinds of information that tie your name to your waking reality, and if the wrong person gets a hold of the keys to “you,” you’re in harm’s way.

But there is good news: You can take proactive measures to minimize your exposure.