Question - Anyone use Experian - protectmyid.com ?

[R_Bert]

Does anyone have knowledge of this credit monitoring outfit? - http://www.protectmyid.com/Default.aspx?SiteVersionID=845&SiteID=100302&sc=677382&bcd=&campaignID=29

 

Back in July, the Department of Energy allowed its systems to get hacked, and released a lot of Personally Identifiable Information on many current employees & retirees. They "magnanimously" offer a free year of credit monitoring services through Experian.

 

Honestly, the reviews for that outfit do not look very good at all to me.

 

Thoughts? Is the solution more risk than the problem?

 

Bert

 

[Guest TankerHC]

Bert. Everything these credit monitoring services do, and charge for, you can do for free. Monitoring, alerts, authorizations, all of it. I do know they are one of the big 3. I know because I have had a total of 31 credit report disputes between them this year alone and won all of them. That's how accurate they are. Sent from my SPH-L720 using Tapatalk 2 Edited October 24, 2013 by TankerHC

[R_Bert]

Bert. Everything these credit monitoring services do, and charge for, you can do for free. Monitoring, alerts, authorizations, all of it. I do know they are one of the big 3. I know because I have had a total of 31 credit report disputes between them this year alone and won all of them. That's how accurate they are. Sent from my SPH-L720 using Tapatalk 2

 

Accuracy does seem to be an issue in many of the reviews.

[tnguy]

Experian is the one that just sold a bunch of personal information, including SSIDs to a guy who provides identity theft info to, well, identity thieves.

http://krebsonsecurity.com/2013/10/experian-sold-consumer-data-to-id-theft-service/

[R_Bert]

Experian is the one that just sold a bunch of personal information, including SSIDs to a guy who provides identity theft info to, well, identity thieves.

http://krebsonsecurity.com/2013/10/experian-sold-consumer-data-to-id-theft-service/

 

Thank you.  That settles it.

 

'we're from the government.  We're here to help'    :rant:

[MacGyver]

As a forensic professional, our experience is that credit monitoring is non-responsive to the problem of identity theft.  It's kind of like a smoke alarm.  It's not going to prevent anything.  If it goes off, you're on fire.

 

Unfortunately, it's become sort of the defacto "give me something" response to data breaches.  There are two contributors to this.  One, our government sort of set the standard of giving it away in every breach they've had.  And two, it's cheap.  When a provider is buying them in bulk, credit monitoring costs a few pennies per person when you're buying them 100k at a time.  But, that gets sold to the company that had a breach to provide to its customers for several dollars.  There's a huge amount of money in it, so it keeps getting offered.

 

I wouldn't tell anyone not to take it, but understand that there's nothing being done there that you cannot reliably do yourself.  Open and read both your bank statements and credit card statements each and every month.  Get your credit reports at least once a year (you're entitled to one per year from each of the three providers for free - go to annualcreditreport.com - not freecreditreport.com where they try to sell you stuff).  Finally, put a credit freeze on your account with Experian, Transunion and Equifax.  This will lock down your credit so that no one can pull it without you removing it via a PIN first.

 

Then, know that if you get your identity stolen and actually become a victim, there are some great services out there that can take the burden of recovery off of you and get it resolved.

[R_Bert]

As a forensic professional, our experience is that credit monitoring is non-responsive to the problem of identity theft.  It's kind of like a smoke alarm.  It's not going to prevent anything.  If it goes off, you're on fire.

 

Unfortunately, it's become sort of the defacto "give me something" response to data breaches.  There are two contributors to this.  One, our government sort of set the standard of giving it away in every breach they've had.  And two, it's cheap.  When a provider is buying them in bulk, credit monitoring costs a few pennies per person when you're buying them 100k at a time.  But, that gets sold to the company that had a breach to provide to its customers for several dollars.  There's a huge amount of money in it, so it keeps getting offered.

 

I wouldn't tell anyone not to take it, but understand that there's nothing being done there that you cannot reliably do yourself.  Open and read both your bank statements and credit card statements.  Get your credit reports at least once a year (you're entitled to one per year from each of the three providers for free - go to annualcreditreport.com - not freecreditreport.com where they try to sell you stuff).  Finally, put a credit freeze on your account with Experian, Transunion and Equifax.  This will lock down your credit so that no one can pull it without you removing it via a PIN first.

 

Then, know that if you get your identity stolen and actually become a victim, there are some great services out there that can take the burden of recovery off of you and get it resolved.

 

How do you typically do the credit freeze, via letter ?

[MacGyver]

Here are links for each of the three bureaus.  Unfortunately the lobbyists have persuaded our lawmakers to make this way more difficult than it needs to be.  Right now you have to go to each of the three bureaus:

 

Experian - http://www.experian.com/consumer/security_freeze.html

 

Transunion - http://www.transunion.com/personal-credit/credit-disputes/credit-freezes.page - This is the bureau most commonly used to pull consumer reports right now

 

Equifax - https://www.freeze.equifax.com/Freeze/jsp/SFF_PersonalIDInfo.jsp

 

Also, if you have children, this is well worth doing for them as well.  Though in the case of a minor, you'll have to write the bureaus first to see if your child has a credit report before you can place a freeze.  With recent changes in the law, it's not uncommon for minors to have some form of credit report.  Criminals know this, and we see cases all the time where family members take advantage of their young family members' credit to finance their bad habits.

 

Here's some info on that through Experian that's applicable to all three bureaus.

[Guest TankerHC]

You can go here and do all three at once free. You will find this link on the FTC website and can have them mailed and downloaded, and view immediately once a year. Just check the blocks on the ones you want. Also, keep in mind that if you decide to pay the 6 bucks or whatever for your FICO score (And other scores) make sure you uncheck or decline the FREE credit monitoring service, you will start getting charged in 30 days. Also, go over it carefully. If you see something wrong, one click dispute, they will then require a copy of your SSN and some other documentation, send it in. It may mean the difference between say an 680 or 750 credit score. Do all three, a lot of times you will see things on one report that are not on another. Credit score evaluations may be different also, but generally close and the FICO score is the FICO score.

 

https://www.annualcreditreport.com/requestReport/landingPage.action;jsessionid=Anx5iBpF8HZj7WBdCzVDAr3fFVOhmz6naoCAmKZJ

[tnguy]

Experian is the one that just sold a bunch of personal information, including SSIDs to a guy who provides identity theft info to, well, identity thieves.

http://krebsonsecurity.com/2013/10/experian-sold-consumer-data-to-id-theft-service/

That should be SSNs of course :D

[vontar]

Where I have worked for the past 9 years they have had issues twice and both times gave us 1 or 2 years of free monitoring.  I took it.

 

Since then I have put a freeze on my credit with all 3 monitoring companies.  I am lead to believe no credit can be opened in my name with the freeze on their unless I unfreeze it.

[R_Bert]

Where I have worked for the past 9 years they have had issues twice and both times gave us 1 or 2 years of free monitoring.  I took it.

 

Since then I have put a freeze on my credit with all 3 monitoring companies.  I am lead to believe no credit can be opened in my name with the freeze on their unless I unfreeze it.

 

I probably would have taken it except for the whole "they sell the customer's PII " thing.