A leading provider of independent service reviews for consumers, NextAdvisor, is launching its free 'Child Identity Theft Protection Guide' designed to raise awareness of the growing threat of child identity theft and give parents simple, actionable tips on how to protect their children from being victimized by identity thieves.

    Joe Fahrner, NextAdvisor.com's Vice President of Research said: "Our research shows that parents don't realize just how serious a problem child identity theft is in the United States", "Children now represent a significant portion of the overall identity theft victims in the United States and that number is growing at an alarming rate. There needs to be better awareness about child identity theft prevention."

    According to the FTC in 2005, the most recent year for which data is currently available, 5 percent of the 255,000 victims of identity theft were under the age of 18. The number of children victimized by identity theft has increased 40 percent since 2003.

    The 'Child Identity Theft Protection Guide' is available for free on NextAdvisor.com's website and provides daily, quarterly and annual steps that parents can take to protect their children.

    Among the useful information included in the guide are instructions on how to check the status of a child's credit file with each of the three major credit reporting bureaus. Since none of the credit bureaus maintain files on minors the check should come back negative. NextAdvisor recommends parents check with each of the credit bureaus once per quarter for the existence of a credit file in their child's name.

    Fahrner said: "Our Child Identity Theft Protection Guide is all about awareness", "We are trying to help make it easier for parents to protect their children."

    NextAdvisor.com is the trusted, independent source for comparing the most valuable new Internet services. The company's mission is to help consumers save money and improve their lives by presenting them with useful comparisons and reviews of service providers and a clear explanation of each service and how it works.

    NextAdvisor.com selects service areas to evaluate based on many factors but the primary criterion is value to the consumer. The company currently reviews, compares and explains many different types of internet services including credit report and monitoring, identity theft protection, voice over ip, diet plans, DVD rental and movie download, online education, online tax preparation and online backup.