security breach notices - how serious do you take them?

I get a security breach notice almost weekly. I tend to just toss them after seeing what's been breached. I monitor my accounts pretty heavily so hopefully I can catch anything before it gets out of hand.

Credit freezes are the way to go. It's pretty simple.

I do check my bank accounts several times per week.

I've had my credit frozen/locked for a while now. Just this week I received a breach notice saying my SSN, birthdate, address, and other info was found on a black web site. Yay. At least I have peace of mind that no accounts or anything can be opened in my name.

NOT a silly question and it's not hard


www.usa.gov/credit-freeze

I’m glad you asked . I have been about doing this.

I did a credit freeze with the three companies when the Equifax debacle happened. Just know that if you apply for any credit card, re-finance, open a bank account, apply for a loan, you will need to thaw for a day or two.

I also use two factor authentication when I can and my bank and cc company notifies me of all transactions.

I think we just accept that our info is out there and we need to stay on top of making it harder for the crooks to use.

Those are usually easy to see but breeches from your insurance or healthcare. I think we have had multiple from our dentist, Kaiser and I know there have been many other companies that have had breeches that affect millions of Americans.

Never click on a suspicious link in an email or text. Go directly to the site. I don’t answer an unknown number and actually have them silenced as I have been getting multiple a day. If important they will leave a voicemail.

My assumption is that for every breach notice that is sent out there are several breaches that are either (1) not known about or (2) covered up.

We have all of our credit locked with all agencies. We unlock it if we need to use credit and then lock it again when done.

In addition to credit being frozen I also log into my social security account and they now require more secure logins. So that is worthwhile as well.

I have a freeze on my credit with all three major bureaus after someone opened a JetBlue credit card in my name. I found out about it through my (free) CreditKarma account, which emails me with alerts when there are certain changes in my credit file. New credit accounts is one of those. I logged into CreditKarma, saw the new account, called the company, which was Barclays, and they removed it from my account pretty quickly. They were like "you're certain you didn't open this?" and I said "yup, if the person bought a flight and it hasn't happened yet, go to the airport and that's probably the person." I realize it's not that simple but I was like "just go get them." I'm sure they didn't but I would love if that sort of thing was how it worked. I do think that I caught it earlier than most of these situations because of the CK alert.

I didn't realize until a little later that that might not be the end of it. I got the card in the mail about a week later, and I also got a letter from Barclays that they would let me know the results of their investigation within 60 days in terms of whether they would resolve it in my favor. But they did ultimately do that and it disappeared from my credit file way before I got the letter.

If you go to each of the bureaus, there is a link to freeze or lock your credit. I did it with each one. Later, I did unfreeze it for a car loan and I decided I wanted an airline credit card for the points bonus, but it was very easy to unfreeze and then refreeze. I think at least one lets you determine the unfreeze duration and then freezes it again. Even though it was unfrozen, I did still have to jump through some hoops with my bank for the car loan and Chase for the card. I think that's because I also have some other thing on my credit where any new creditor has to confirm that it is me. I don't mind that and in fact it makes me feel a bit better.

Since that time, some sort of weird loan also hit my credit file with, I think, Transunion. I was alerted through CreditKarma and filed a dispute immediately. It was for around $400. So even with all the locked-down, frozen stuff I have on my credit, that still snuck through.

CreditKarma is free. They do want you to get credit cards through them and loans and stuff. I think it's an Intuit company. I just ignore all that. There are other ones as well but CK is the one I happened to start with. They will also let you know if there's been an inquiry on your file, which for me is how the JetBlue stuff started. I have a couple of open, paid off Barclays cards so at first I thought Barclays was just reviewing for a credit increase or to close the account since it's not been used for a while. I'm not even sure that is how it works, but that's what I thought at first. Nope.

I like to picture the cops arresting a woman with a bad dye job, an almost tasteful track suit and bad shoes at the gate of the airport, getting ready to board her fancy JetBlue flight with her fake Louis Vuitton personal item filled with the latest technology and all the ill intentions she couldn't fit in her conniving little head, but I know that's probably not how it all worked out. JETBLUE. That's way fancier than any of my travel aspirations, people.