Waste Disposal, Paper Recycling and Identity Theft

Which is safer to protecting the information written on your discarded paper: recycling or trash disposal? 

ANSWER: Some people think the trash is better. However, neither method is secure for personal or confidential information.

Here are some basic facts, preventive steps and tips to help you while still getting rid of unwanted paper and/or clutter:

• Always shred personal, confidential or sensitive documents, before discarding them. Then you may add them to your paper recycling. For shredding paper instructions
• Shred documents, credit card offers and other personal, confidential or sensitive documents in a timely manner. In other words, don't leave the credit card offer sit in your mail box for any extended amount of time. For that matter, don't accumulate these documents or other personal or confidential documents un-necessarily for an extended time the volume of documents makes the act of shredding albeit important - that much more tedious.
• Shredders are now readily available over a wide price range. Or, at minimum, tear out and rip up your name, address, account information, and the like, by hand.

Portsmouth is mandatory recycling and these shreds qualify as paper waste to be recycled.