Protect your information after a data breach

Sooner or later, we will all have our private information exposed, says Greg McBride, financial analyst at Bankrate.com.

That's certainly the new reality for many Americans whose personal information was revealed in data breaches in the past two weeks.

Dating site Ashley Madison, drugstore CVS and the U.S. Office of Personnel Management are among the latest to report that private information was hacked.

But just because your Social Security number or  bank account is exposed doesn't doom you to be a victim of identity theft, says McBride. If you protect yourself, your information won't be worth as much in the wrong hands.

1.  Call your bank

If a company doesn't have your updated address, you may not be notified your data was leaked, says Michael Bruemmer from the data breach response team at credit monitor Experian.

If you suspect your information has been exposed, it's worth calling your local bank branch, says Ted Peters, a banking executive who testified before Congress on cybersecurity. Ask for the security department, then ask for IT or a cyber fraud expert, Peters says. Put everyone in your bank on notice, verbally and in writing.

To be on the safe side, change your account numbers, too.

2. Practice good digital hygiene 

In a perfect world, you'd never bank online — and if you did, it would be on a dedicated, secure computer just for banking (no kids allowed), that spent most of the day turned off. But if that's not possible, there are things you can do to stay safe.

Avoid public Wi-Fi, says Ken Westin, cybersecurity expert for Tripwire. If you have no choice, you can buy access to services like privateinternetaccess.com that route your online activities through an encrypted pathway.

Type the domain for your bank into your browser, rather than clicking links in emails, Westin says.  Be sure you see a green or gold lock next to the "https://." If the lock is broken or you just see "http://," you aren't on a secure connection, and you should wait to access your bank.

Finally, use a password manager like LastPass or 1Password to make sure all your passwords are different, Westin says. Change them at least every 90 days.