In this article, we’ll provide you with a step-by-step guide to offering employers an employee benefit, including how to present the identity theft landscape, what employers need out of an identity protection benefit, and some common questions employers may have about an identity protection benefit.
The digital age has brought an endless number of wonders, enabling us to have almost anything delivered to our front doors, instantly connect face-to-face to someone on the other side of the planet, and access the collective knowledge of the world whenever we please. However, with those wonders have also come inherent dangers.
Cybercriminals have harnessed the full power of that advanced technology to execute their schemes. With an ever-growing arsenal of techniques and tactics, they can harvest your personal information, steal your money, and wreak havoc on your life.
And this very real threat of identity theft isn’t just impacting consumers—it’s impacting their employers as well. That’s why for employers, offering an identity protection benefit has become crucial for protecting employees, maximizing employee efficiency, and retaining talent.
The state of identity theft in 2025
When you consider all the research that’s available on identity theft, one thing becomes clear: it’s impacting more people than ever. And as the number of people affected by identity theft increases, so do the financial losses associated with it. The numbers paint a very concerning picture:
Over 365,000 cases of identity theft were reported to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in the first quarter of 2025, an increase of almost 25 percent compared to the final quarter of 2024.
$27 billion was lost to identity fraud in 2024 (a 19 percent increase from 2023), impacting 18 million victims.
Over 1.35 billion people had their information exposed in data breaches in 2024, significantly increasing their risk of identity theft.
And while conventional forms of identity theft like tax identity theft are prevalent, other types of identity fraud are increasing. This includes credit card fraud, which increased by 24 percent from the last quarter of 2024, and employment fraud, which increased by a whopping 116 percent from the previous quarter.
And you might think that elderly populations are more likely to be identity theft victims. After all, older adults often have retirement funds and investment accounts that make them attractive targets for scammers. To a certain degree, you’d be right—the elderly (ages 60+) lost over $3.8 billion to fraud in 2024, making them the most victimized group by far.
However, you might also be surprised to learn that younger adults are far more likely to be a victim of identity fraud. In fact, those 30 through 39 were the most victimized age group in 2024 with over 272,000 reports of identity theft.
Younger generations are not safe from identity theft. There were over 23,000 reports of identity theft for those 19 and younger in 2023—that’s an average of over 60 reports a day. This rise in child identity theft could be due to synthetic identity theft in which fraudsters steal a child’s identity and build credit in their name with the goal of taking out loans or racking up a large balance on credit cards and then abandoning those accounts.
The takeaway here is that identity theft doesn’t discriminate. It’s important to offer an identity protection benefit that protects a member’s entire family as anyone in the family can be targeted.
How identity theft impacts employees
When we think about the impacts of identity theft, the most obvious is the financial impact. And that’s for good reason—identity theft can have a significant impact on a person’s finances.
Many Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, and when you consider that 30 percent of general consumers reported that they were unable to pay rent or pay bills as the result of identity theft, the impact of the crime becomes readily apparent. However, identity theft can have far-reaching impacts on a person beyond their finances. This includes impacts on their physical and mental health, as well as one their work life.
The impact on employee health
When a person experiences the stress associated with identity theft, it can have serious consequences for both their physical and mental health.
Victims of identity theft reported a range of physical and mental impacts of identity theft, including:
Persistent aches, pains, and headaches (32 percent of general consumers)
Sleep problems (39 percent of general consumers)
Panic or anxiety attacks (38 percent of Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC) victims)
Feeling worried or anxious (67 percent of ITRC victims)
Experiencing depression (52 percent of ITRC victims)
Feeling angry (67 percent of ITRC victims)
These impacts can affect every aspect of an employee’s life beyond their physical and emotional state. This includes one of the most important parts of an employee’s life—their work.
The impact on work
Identity theft is an inherently personal situation—each incident is unique and the experience for each victim is unique. The impacts from this personal event can have far-reaching effects, especially when it comes to the victim’s work.
Resolving an identity theft incident can take days, weeks, or even months. In fact, 48 percent of ITRC victims reported that their identity theft incident hadn’t been fully resolved after 6 months to a year. And without the right resources and support, the recovery effort involves a ton of calls and emails, as well as a long to-do list, which can involve contacting credit bureaus, verifying charges, and more.
As you can imagine, navigating this recovery effort can take a lot of time and effort, pulling an employee’s attention away from work. And that’s not all—the emotional stress of the situation can also impact an employee’s work life. According to the ITRC:
31 percent of general consumers reported lost time at work
26 percent of general consumers lost an employment opportunity
31 percent of general consumers reported a strained relationship with their boss
How identity protection benefits your clients
A quality identity protection benefit should not only protect your clients' employees and their families—it should help protect their business as well.
Protects productivity
With the discussion about the impact that identity theft can have on an employee’s work life, we know that it can affect their productivity, their time at work, and their relationship with their boss.
By implementing an identity protection solution, employers can help reduce negative effects that an identity theft incident has on an employee. With certified restoration experts handling all aspects of the restoration journey, the employee can focus on their work and avoid the stress associated with identity theft.
In turn, this could lead to less distraction and better focus, helping to protect an employee’s productivity and the company’s profits. The support provided as part of an identity protection benefit can also greatly reduce their stress, which helps maintain the healthy workplace relationships that an employee needs to be at their best.
Employees are understandably concerned about the dangers of data breaches and identity thieves. In fact, 95 percent of Americans expressed deep concern regarding personal info leaks.
Those employees can now rest easy knowing they have comprehensive identity protection that not only monitors their identity but comes with a team of restoration experts that will handle every aspect of the restoration journey the event of identity theft.
Reduces liability
Depending on how an employee’s identity was compromised, a company could find itself facing a massive lawsuit. That’s because courts are increasingly holding companies responsible when they expose the personal data of employees and customers.
When companies fail to comply with laws that protect employee data, like the FACT Act, they can face millions in fines—and not just from the federal government. State and local governments are increasingly suing companies they believe violated their citizens’ privacy.
By providing identity protection as an employee benefit before a data breach occurs, companies signal that they value their employees’ privacy and are taking active steps to protect them. This, coupled with a comprehensive security plan, can help reduce litigation risks.
Limit reputational damage
For a company, maintaining their reputation is critical to its success. And when a criminal gets access to a personal account such as a social media account or email account, they can cause irreparable to your company’s reputation. And unfortunately, this type of incident is becoming more and more common. According to the Identity Theft Resource Center’s 2025 Trends in Identity Report, account takeovers involving personal tech accounts have increased by over 754 percent in the last year.
This reputational damage can take the form of them messaging customers and clients asking for funds, publicizing confidential information, making derogatory remarks about the company, and more. This can lead to the loss of clients, significant public relations efforts to repair the company’s reputation, financial fraud, and other issues.
Not only will a proven identity protection solution alert members if their credentials have been compromised, but it will also monitor their social media accounts for any unusual activity as well.
Attract and retain top talent
Providing employees with identity protection helps employers not only attract top talent but also retain them. After all, 54 percent of employees stay with current employers because of their benefits, and 53 percent of employees will likely move to a new company that offers better benefits.
And with 80 percent of brokers reporting that their clients ask for recommendations on identity theft protection vendors, it’s clear that many companies are offering identity protection as a means of attracting new talent and retaining their employees.
Important criteria employees want in identity protection
While there are a range of options for identity protection benefits, there are some must-have features and functionalities that employees are looking for. These features and functionalities include:
More than just credit monitoring
Near real-time of both credit and non-credit account activity, including:
New applications for credit cards, wireless carriers, and utilities
Unauthorized account access
Compromised passwords or login credentials
Password resets, fund transfers, high-risk banking activities, and more
Protection from scams
Comprehensive scam protection and prevention provides:
Automated scam detection across email, texts, and notification
Reimbursement when employees fall victim to scams, protecting their finances and wellbeing
Updates and alerts regarding the latest scam schemes and threats
Social media monitoring
With social media monitoring, employees can prevent criminals from:
Using the hijacked account to obtain sensitive data like physical addresses and passwords
Launching phishing campaigns targeted at the victim’s co-workers
Damaging their reputation or their company’s reputation
Enhanced digital privacy and safety
A comprehensive identity theft solution will include features that enhance digital privacy and safety, including:
Family digital safety tools that protect the most vulnerable members, including web filtering, screen time management, and location tracking
Data removal tools that automatically monitor data broker sites for an employee’s personal information and delete the information
Informative alerts sent directly to employee devices that detail recent data breaches, new fraud schemes, and more
Full-service identity restoration
A quality identity protection benefit will facilitate the identity restoration process with:
a team of dedicated and certified restoration specialists available 24/7 to handle the most time-consuming and tedious portions of reclaiming an identity.
Financial protection
The identity protection plan(s) you offer must include an identity theft insurance policy that:
Reimburses employees for related legal fees, lost wages, medical record request fees, CPA fees, childcare fees, and more
Includes an insurance policy with a minimum of $1 million in restoration reimbursement
Ongoing, superb support and high customer satisfaction rates
A quality identity protection benefit is backed by a proven customer support team and provides quality service before and after an incident, including:
Product updates
Utilization data
Employee education opportunities
Flexible benefits structure
Consider offering a policy that allows the following payment models to give your clients the flexibility they need to offer an identity protection benefit that works for both the company and its employees:
Employee paid
Voluntary
Hybrid
Questions your clients may have about identity protection
At Allstate Identity Protection, we work with hundreds of brokers across the nation, and we’re always here to help them answer any questions their clients might have.
Can implementing an identity protection benefit lower our overall corporate risk? Identity protection helps raise employee awareness about cybercrime, and employees may become less likely to click risky email links, share sensitive corporate data, use easily cracked passwords, or engage in other risky behavior. A reliable identity protection solution will also include dark web monitoring, which alerts employees when their personal information, including login credentials, are found on the dark web—helping prevents hackers using an employee’s personal information and accounts to access workplace systems.
Why should we implement an identity protection benefit before a breach impacts my employee population? It’s not recommended to wait until a breach has occurred to offer employee identity protection. By that time, you may be too late. Companies should have proactive breach plans that improve employee morale, provide peace of mind, and illustrate that their company cares about protecting their employees’ identities and privacy before a data breach occurs. Additionally, many companies have already been breached or exposed, they just don’t know it.
With employees that are so financially diverse, what financial tools can we introduce that will truly benefit all my employees? Companies generally consist of employees across a wide range of economic profiles. Some may be struggling to pay off student loans, while others are on their second vacation home. Regardless of income, they all share one commonality—they have an identity. Identity protection helps safeguard their finances, as well as the finances of their loved ones, regardless of their income. After all, there’s no telling how costly an identity theft incident can be, and they can leave even the most financially secure people struggling to pay their bills.
I have limited resources to add new benefits. What is the time commitment required for implementation? The answer to this question will vary greatly depending on which identity protection company you partner with. At Allstate Identity Protection, many of our implementations are done in three or fewer calls. From start to finish, our implementation process takes just 30–45 days to complete. And our team provides white glove implementation service, ensuring that your implementation process is as easy and straightforward as possible.
How does identity protection as an employee benefit compared to a direct-to-consumer product? Identity protection as an employee benefit often provides many of the same features and tools. However, identity protection as an employee benefit often offers employees more affordable pricing, consistent reliability, and superior customer service.
To learn more about how Allstate Identity Protection can help protect an employee’s identity and finances, visit our Business Hub. And if you would like more information about adding Allstate Identity Protection to your portfolio, please reach out.
