Here are the top credit reporting services that you can use to stay on the top of your credit score at all times:

1. Equifax: Equifax gives you immediate access to your 3 nationwide credit reports and daily monitoring of all 3 credit reports with customizable alerts. You are also guaranteed by up to $1,000,000 dollars in insurance.

2. MyFico: MyFico is the top dog in the credit reporting category. It monitors your credit report at Equifax on a daily basis and your FICO^® score on a weekly basis and lets you know when you reach your target score or when you qualify for a better interest rate. You’ll also get alerts if there are any major changes in your credit report. A great way to keep up with your credit history without having to spend too much on it on a consistent basis.

3. TrueCredit: TrueCredit is another top credit reporting service that lets you keep up with your score and protect yourself against errors and ID theft. TrueCredit gives you 3-Bureau Credit Reports & Scores that can be  updated every 30 days plus alerts once major changes have happened in your credit report. You also get $25,000 ID theft insurance as a part of this package.

4. Free Score 360: one of the best ways to protect your identity is by keeping on top your credit record. And what a better way to do that by getting your credit information from credit bureaus. Free Score 360 gets you all 3 credit reports from TransUnion, Equifax & Experian, and it monitors them for you as well. This service allows you to stay on the top of your credit history at all times and avoid major errors or issues on your report.

5. CreditReport.com: another credit monitoring service that monitors your 3 credit reports and makes sure you are in the know when a change happens in our credit report. CreditReport.com alerts help you keep an open eye and defeat ID thefts before they can do any major damage.

Whether you decide to go with one of these premium services or just stick with your free credit scores, you want to make sure you read your reports carefully to identify any errors or suspicious entries. The last thing you want is not getting the deal or the job you deserve because of an error in your credit report.

Not every credit card provider is included in this list. This is not the only site you can gather information on your credit card issuer. But the tool is pretty useful. It’s interesting to note that the Federal Reserve seems to be encouraging people to use their “credit,” albeit more wisely. The trouble is people should stay away from spending the money they not only don’t have but won’t have. That’s a big part of the problem the U.S. is experiencing.

Credit cards are great tools, and the practices used by credit card companies have been somewhat detrimental to consumers. The trouble is there are many folks who spend beyond their means without having any way to pay it back. While the new rules will protect those consumers somewhat, they won’t pay the bills. It is still essential for everyone to be as careful as possible when dealing with credit card companies.

Blippy is one of those startups. It’s based on a very interesting concept. Essentially, you provide them with your financial information, and the service tells the world what you are buying. On the surface, it sounds like a very interesting service. After all, you can give others an idea what you are buying for real. What you don’t expect to see with such a service is your credit card numbers been leaked to Google. Unfortunately, that’s what seems to have happened. It’s not known how widespread the problem is, but the fact that some credit card numbers have made it to Google’s cache is alarming.

That’s the problem with giving away your credit card information to any company. Some companies are better than others when handling your private information but no service is foolproof. You can always keep on the top of your credit report or sign up for an ID protection service to reduce the risk of your identity and financial information being stolen without you knowing it. But the best way to approach this is by not giving up your information to companies you are not too sure about. In fact, you should try to minimize the number of companies that have access to your information.

Here is how Blippy people intend to fix the issue:

As a continuation of our efforts from yesterday, when four credit card numbers were discovered in Google’s cache, we’re taking the following measures: 1. We’re continuing to work with Google to have them remove all sensitive information from their cache. 2. We’re analyzing our backup databases from January and February to understand what additional information the Google cache may have.

Would that really make people who have had their information found on Google feel better? I am not sure. That’s why you should not share your information with any company unless you absolutely have to. “Social” may be the game in town but that does not mean you should risk having your sensitive information exposed to the world just because you want to be “social.”

The app will continue locating your iPhone and sending you e-mails so you know where your phone is. You can then use the information to retrieve your iPhone and inform the authorities. In these tough times, there are plenty of unethical people and criminals who don’t feel bad grabbing your phone. This app can certainly teach them to think twice before they pick up another iPhone.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could just turn your credit card information off when this happened in real life? We are still far away from bio-metric and wireless solutions such as that. In the meantime, you can count on apps such as Trap a Thief to recover your stolen phone, and that’s a start.

If you are looking for a a credit card iPhone application, here are 5 you should try:

ProcessAway Credit Card Terminal: one of the best credit card apps for iPhone. Let’s you authorize and capture charges, verify and hold funds, void holds, issue refunds, and do all kinds of things for your business on the go.

Billing- Credit Card Terminal: a premium credit card terminal application for iPhone that lets you enter transactions, manage your customers, and your business tax issues right on your phone.

A Personal Assistant Premium: a wonderful iPhone app that lets you manage your bank accounts and credit card information while you are on the move.

Debt Snowball Pro: if you have got a lot of debt, and you want to eliminate your debt as fast as possible, Debt Snowball is your app. Very simple to use and helps you find out how much you need to pay to finish up your loan as fast as possible.

iMerchant Pro – Credit Card Terminal: lets you take credit cards, email receipts, track sales, and more right on your phone.

What’s your favorite iPhone credit card application

There are many ways to find out whether your identity is stolen and protect yourself against further attempts, which is why keeping track of your credit information is important. By knowing what’s in your credit and how it’s changed, you can foil the ID thieves easier. Thankfully, there are various tools that let you track your credit and get alerts in case of a suspicious activity. Here are the top credit protection tools that you can use to protect your ID like a pro:

1. LifeLock: LifeLock really needs no introduction. You have probably seen those commercials about the CEO of LifeLock giving his social security to everyone in a street. Now, you don’t want to do that, but it’s good to know that you are protected by a company that constantly monitors your information to make sure everything is in order. With LifeLock, you get $1,000,000 service guarantee backed by XL Capital, and your fraud report stays in the system for 90 days. With LifeLock, you also get credit reports. These guys remove your name from the list of pre-approved credit offers. eReco (another LifeLock service) goes through known criminal websites for the illegal selling or trading of your personal information (including your Social Security number, credit card number, driver’s license and email address, if provided) and informs you when something is found. TrueAddress notifies you when we detect any new address information associated with your name in address databases nationwide. Overall, LifeLock is one of the best ways to protect your identity at all times. No system is foolproof, but it’d be awfully tough to fool LifeLock.

2. TrustedID: TrustedID is another great ID theft protection solution for individuals and families. IDFreeze helps you protect yourself against ID theft before they happen. CreditLock makes sure your credit report is not available to anyone without your permission. Overall, TrustedID is a great choice for families. Here are some of the other services that you get with TrustedID ID Theft protection service:

• Fraud Flags
• Public Database Scanning
• Credit Card Scanning
• Social Security Number Scanning
• Name & Address Scanning
• Bank Account Number Scanning
• Lost Wallet Protection
• Medical Benefits Protection
• Annual Credit Reports
• $1,000,000 Warranty Protection
• Family Protection

3. ID Watchdog: ID Watchdog is another great tool to protect your identity against hackers and thieves. The company monitors your credit and private information on a monthly basis to protect you against hackers and thieves. You can also refer to ID Watchdog if your ID is already stolen. ID Rehab helps you get your ID back without you having to do too much work. The ID Watchdog agents contact the financial companies on your behalf and fix things that have been damaged by the thieves.

4. Equifax: Equifax provides you with more than just your credit report and credit score. It also protects your identity against theft as well. Equifax ID Patrol is a tool that protects you against theft attempts against your identity. The system alerts you if your personal information is found on Internet trading sites. You are also protected up to $1,000,000 identity theft insurance and 24/7 access to ID Theft Resolution Specialists that are there to help you address issues with your credit issues. You can also lock and unlock your Equifax credit file to protect yourself. And it does help that Equifax monitors all credit bureau institutions  to help you find and solve any issues with your credit reports.

5. IdentityTruth: IdentityTruth is an interesting VC-funded credit protection service that lets you monitor your credit information and prevent ID theft. IdentityTruth protects you by:

• providing you with Alerts notifying you of breaches, potential risks, offering “what’s next” advice.
• letting you know if someone is currently misusing your identity.
• alerting you about potential threats before you become an identity theft victim.
• providing fraud alerts on your credit accounts to foil criminals.
• monitoring of your consumer credit report including alerts to critical changes and updates to your credit history.
• managing your online reputation.
• managing your junk mail and protecting you against bogus offers.

6. ReputationDefender: another great tool that protects you against identity thieves. What I like about ReputationDefender is that it offers an ID protection service for your kids as well as yourself. If you want to protect your child’s ID, you’ve got MyChild. You can also protect your privacy online and even have ReputationDefender monitor the search engines and remove your personal information. In summary, here is what you get:

• MyChild
• MyReputation
• MyPrivacy
• MyEdge

7. Free Score 360: one of the best ways to protect your identity is by keeping on top your credit record. And what a better way to do that by getting your credit information from credit bureaus. Free score 360 gets you all 3 credit reports from TransUnion, Equifax & Experian, and it monitors them for you as well. So you are never left out in the cold.

8. CreditReport.com: another credit monitoring service that monitors your 3 credit reports and makes sure you are in the know when a change happens in our credit report. CreditReport.com alerts help you keep an open eye and defeat ID thefts before they can do any major damage.

I never thought my identity would be and could be stolen. But it happened. There is no fool proof way to protect your identity. Hackers and thieves are constantly getting better and are on the lookout to get their hands on your private information. By using the above service, you won’t have to go at it alone. Ignoring this risk is not going to keep you protected. The sooner you get started with the above service, the better chance you have of avoiding your sensitive information from becoming compromised.

We are getting awfully close to tax time, and a lot of people are worried about getting their taxes done right. But there is never a better time to protect your identity with ID theft services than right now. Many ID theft companies are offering promotions either for tax time or just in general to help you get your financial life in order and avoid having to deal with identity theft. LifeLock and TrustID are two top ID Theft protection services that are running promotions in the month of February. So don’t forget to check them out before they expire:

• LifeLock: one of the best ID theft service protections on the market. For a limited time, they are giving away the H&R tax software for free for those who sign up for their service. Ends by the end of February
• TrustID: you can save 20% on all Family Identity Theft Protection plans. If you want to give your family the gift of ID protection, TrustID is a great option to consider.

Both these services can help you reduce the risk of having your ID stolen by hackers and ID thieves. ID theft could happen to anybody no matter how you are careful. And while I don’t recommend sharing your information (e.g. social security #) with the world. the above services could give you peace of mind on a daily basis.

Credit card companies will have to find more ways to extract money from their customers. One way to do that is by adding an inactivity fee. So if you don’t use your card enough, you may have to pay a fee to keep your account open. Annual fee and higher APRs may also be in the horizon.

So here is the moral of story. Credit card rules may have gotten tighter with addition of more consumer protection measures. At the same time, that is not going to keep credit issuers from finding ways to make money off of you. If you have a card that you don’t use regularly, you may want to cancel it or distribute your costs evenly across all your credit cards. But don’t fall for this scheme and spend more than you have. Canceling a credit line may not be ideal, but if it saves you money, it’s a must.

You heard that right. Credit card companies are not too happy about the latest regulations that will go into effect in the next year, and they are using every lawful tool available to them to make enough money to cover their losses. So it’s not surprising to see them raise their interest rates. But an APR of 79.9%? Is that even possible? Apparently it is. First Premier Bank has now become the record holder in the APR department by charging an obscene amount of interest. The bank is apparently testing the fees and may not keep it on forever.

In reality, you can’t blame credit card companies for trying to be profitable businesses. But there needs to be regulations to protect consumers against obscene interest rates. Most people wouldn’t even fall for such offers, but people are so desparate these days that you just don’t know what they are willing to do. The CEO of Cardhub put it best:

Even when the cost of credit is astronomical, for people in true emergencies, it’s much better than not having access to credit

At the end of the day, we need to change the culture of spending in this country. You should not spend the money you don’t have and looking at the possibility of paying 79.9% interest on the balance due on an annual basis should only turn people off. Unfortunately people continue to go beyond their means and no regulation seems to change that.

Visa Black Card is not for the faint of heart. It’s certainly not for everyone. It’s one thing to get a good credit card. Getting an excellent credit credit card can be tough, but luxury credit cards such as  Visa Black card push it to a whole other level. Visa Black Card is a luxury credit card offer by Barclay’s Bank designed for about 1% of folks in the U.S.

The Visa Black card will get you noticed. It’s made of carbon graphite, which sets it apart from other plastic cards on the market. But if that’s not enough, only a certain few can even qualify for this card. And if you are lucky to qualify for Visa Black card, you’ll enjoy 24-hour Concierge Service and luxury gifts from some of the world’s top brands. There is also a cash back feature (1%), which could come in handy as this card packs great spending power, and the more you spend, the more change you will have for other things. And don’t forget the Travel Lounge Priority Pass!

Who’s this card for?

For anyone who qualifies for the offer (but don’t hold your breath if your credit is not perfect). Only a select few can get this card. You can apply for this card as a consumer or professional. But if you have had experience with American Express Centurion or Accolades card, you probably know how hard it is to get approved for these luxury credit cards.The Visa luxury Black card is a great addition to the world of luxury credit offers. Not everyone can get it, and the $495 annual fee is not cheap, but if you do get it, you know you have made it