How Do You Freeze Your Credit?

In recent years, a number of significant and widely publicized data breaches have had consumers more worried about fraud, identity theft, and having their valuable information stolen than ever. In a desire to protect themselves and their information, many people are beginning to ask the question – how do you freeze your credit? While credit freezing has been a thing for quite some time, the 2017 Equifax data breach has made it more accessible than ever. Prior to the data breach at Equifax, it would generally cost a small fee of around $10 to freeze your credit (and then an additional fee when you wanted to unfreeze it again). In 2018, following these security breaches, a group of consumers advocated lobbied congress to change the law making credit freezing free to all consumers including by the three major credit bureaus: Equifax, Experion, and TransUnion.

What is a Credit Freeze?

A credit freeze, also sometimes known as a security freeze, is a tool consumers have that allows them to restrict access to their credit report by making sure the credit reporting bureaus can’t relay any information to anybody who makes an inquiry. This helps protect you against fraud and identity theft by blocking access to your credit report. It is important to note that this blocks all credit inquiries so you will need to unfreeze your credit before doing something like applying for a credit card or taking out a mortgage.

Why would you freeze your credit?

Initiating a credit freeze is often done as a precautionary measure against the theft of personal information. In 2016, Yahoo began to disclose information regarding a data breach that affected over 3 billion of its accounts; in 2017, the Equifax breach led to information being stolen from 143 million affected individuals; Just last year, Capital One lost the information of 106 million people stolen by a hacker. Protecting your information is more important than ever and, if you believe your information is at risk, a credit freeze can be an excellent way to protect yourself.

Does Freezing Your Credit Hurt Your Credit Score?

No! Freezing your credit does not hurt your credit score, nor does it affect your ability to receive your free annual credit report from any of the reporting bureaus. It doesn’t stop you from applying for a job, renting a new place, or purchasing insurance and the credit freeze will have no effect on your score.

Should Everyone Freeze Their Credit?

Freezing your credit is a valuable tool that can act as a buffer against those trying to use your stolen information. While freezing your credit does not affect your credit score, it will prevent you from doing certain things that require a credit inquiry like taking out a loan or opening certain accounts. You can, however, temporarily unfreeze your credit and then freeze it again immediately after the credit inquiry is complete. It adds an extra few steps to the process but for many, that is a small price for the extra level of security that a security freeze brings.

Is Freezing Your Credit Free?

Yes! Ever since September 21st, 2018, freezing your credit is completely free and you can request to have your credit frozen at any of the major credit bureaus at no cost to you. Be sure not to confuse a credit freeze with a credit lock as the work similarly but a credit lock may cause you to incur additional monthly fees.