MONEY
36 KIPLINGER’S PERSONAL FINANCE^ 09/2017
of fraud-fighting, I had
hit a wall of weariness.
Finally, in late April,
I called the police and an
officer stopped by our house,
took notes and filed a report.
I sent it, along with copies
of my driver’s license and
other documents, to Ex-
perian, asking for a freeze
and a copy of my credit re-
port (at no charge, because
I now had proof that I had
been a victim of fraud).
Within two weeks I got a
fat envelope from Experian.
An unsigned letter ac-
knowledged that the freeze
was in place, and my credit
report was included. Under
“Inquiries” was the Capital
One listing that had started
the whole Kaf kaesque expe-
rience. And on the list of
my addresses, there it was:
Springfield, Ill., had become
part of my official history.
That’s why Experian couldn’t
verify my current, real ad-
dress. I just wish they had
told me why. I also sent
the police report to Trans-
Union asking for an extended
fraud alert, which lasts for
seven years. Trans Union
shared that request with
the other two bureaus, and
now all my accounts are fro-
zen and have an extended
fraud alert.
I was lucky. No one actu-
ally managed to open an ac-
count in my name. And now
that my accounts are locked
down, I can finish cleaning
things up and put the night-
mare behind me. I hope. ■information may have been
breached, but I stuck the
letter in a folder and forgot
about it. Maybe that was it?
Maybe, she says, but “we
tell people not to waste
emotional energy trying
to figure it out.”
I retrieved the letter from
Anthem and signed up for
the free credit monitoring
I’d been offered from a ser-
vice called AllClear ID. I
still had six months of mon-
itoring left. But Anthem had
paid for AllClear ID to ac-
cess only one of the three
bureaus, TransUnion. “Free
monitoring of one report
is like locking one of three
doors to the house,” says
credit expert John Ulz-
heimer. (Free credit moni-
toring from Credit Karma
also checks only Trans-
Union.) Services that moni-
tor all three bureaus typi-
cally charge $20 a month.
By the end of October, I
had managed to freeze my
TransUnion and Equifax
accounts. Experian said
it couldn’t identify me to
impose a freeze. To be
absolutely sure no one
had opened accounts in my
name, I needed to recheck
my Experian report and
freeze it. But after a f lurrying at $20 a month, the abil-
ity to lock and unlock your
report for another $20 a
month. I wasn’t planning to
apply for any loans or new
credit cards, so I decided
the best way to protect
myself was to freeze my
accounts (see the box).How it happened. I called Eva
Velasquez of the Identity
Theft Resource Center to
double-check my strategy.
The center is a nonprofit
organization dedicated to
helping victims of ID theft.
Call 888-400-5530 and
you’ll be able to talk with
an adviser, who will send
you a remediation plan.
You’ll find tons of informa-
tion online (www.idtheft
center.org), including an
explanation of the options
available to ID theft victims
and templates for letters
you can use to communicate
with the credit bureaus.
Data breaches are incred-
ibly common, and fraud
rings have f low charts that
help them determine when
to sell stolen information,
says Velasquez. My batch
had probably just been sold.
I recalled that in 2015 I
had received a notice from
Anthem that my personalMark Solheim is
senior editor of
the Money and
Living sections
at Kiplinger’s
Personal Finance
magazine.KipTipPut Your Accounts on Ice
A freeze prevents new creditors from viewing your credit report
or score. The Identity Theft Resource Center says that ID-theft
victims should strongly consider placing a credit freeze after
they’ve cleared up their credit report—and it’s the best way to
prevent ID theft in the first place, even if you don’t suspect any
funny business. You can freeze your reports free if you provide
a police report showing you were a victim of ID theft. Otherwise,
it costs about $10 per bureau, depending on your state. You also
have to pay to lift a freeze when you apply for credit.without more verification.
I downloaded and
scanned the two reports.
Each had the Capital One
inquiry, as well as one from
Discover, but no fraudulent
accounts or new addresses—
yet. I called Discover, was
connected to the fraud de-
partment, and learned that
someone had filed an appli-
cation for a credit card in
my name. (This time the ad-
dress was in Metcalfe, a tiny
town in Mississippi.) I was
assured that the application
would be denied. I had to
get creative to get my credit
report from TransUnion.
One of my Kiplinger col-
leagues contacted someone
in public relations, who put
me in touch with a Trans-
Union rep, who gave me a
link to download my report.
I was beginning to under-
stand the tangled web that
ID thieves weave (to para-
phrase another Brit, Sir
Walter Scott). Scammers
like the one who targeted
me try to steal your per-
sonal information and apply
for credit in your name, but
at a different address. If that
application slips through the
cracks and is approved, it
gets easier and easier to
open more accounts in your
name, and soon your credit
is a bloody mess.
The credit bureaus seemed
more interested in selling
stuff than protecting my
credit. I was never able to
speak to a live human, except
for the TransUnion rep
I reached through my Kip-
linger connections. The
websites were an obstacle
course of dead ends, confus-
ing information and pitches
for products—credit scores
at $8 a pop, credit monitor- LISE METZGER