Category Archives: Innovis

ChexSystems, credit freeze, Equifax, Experian, Informed Delivery, Innovis, NCTUE, plant your flag, Security Tools, SIM swapping, Trans Union

Why & Where You Should You Plant Your Flag

Several stories here have highlighted the importance of creating accounts online tied to your various identity, financial and communications services before identity thieves do it for you. This post examines some of the key places where everyone should plant their virtual flags.

As KrebsOnSecurity observed back in 2018, many people — particularly older folks — proudly declare they avoid using the Web to manage various accounts tied to their personal and financial data — including everything from utilities and mobile phones to retirement benefits and online banking services. From that story:

“The reasoning behind this strategy is as simple as it is alluring: What’s not put online can’t be hacked. But increasingly, adherents to this mantra are finding out the hard way that if you don’t plant your flag online, fraudsters and identity thieves may do it for you.”

“The crux of the problem is that while most types of customer accounts these days can be managed online, the process of tying one’s account number to a specific email address and/or mobile device typically involves supplying personal data that can easily be found or purchased online — such as Social Security numbers, birthdays and addresses.”

In short, although you may not be required to create online accounts to manage your affairs at your ISP, the U.S. Postal Service, the credit bureaus or the Social Security Administration, it’s a good idea to do so for several reasons.

Most importantly, the majority of the entities I’ll discuss here allow just one registrant per person/customer. Thus, even if you have no intention of using that account, establishing one will be far easier than trying to dislodge an impostor who gets there first using your identity data and an email address they control.

Also, the cost of planting your flag is virtually nil apart from your investment of time. In contrast, failing to plant one’s flag can allow ne’er-do-wells to create a great deal of mischief for you, whether it be misdirecting your service or benefits elsewhere, or canceling them altogether.

Before we dive into the list, a couple of important caveats. Adding multi-factor authentication (MFA) at these various providers (where available) and/or establishing a customer-specific personal identification number (PIN) also can help secure online access. For those who can’t be convinced to use a password manager, even writing down all of the account details and passwords on a slip of paper can be helpful, provided the document is secured in a safe place.

Perhaps the most important place to enable MFA is with your email accounts. Armed with access to your inbox, thieves can then reset the password for any other service or account that is tied to that email address.

People who don’t take advantage of these added safeguards may find it far more difficult to regain access when their account gets hacked, because increasingly thieves will enable multi-factor options and tie the account to a device they control.

Secondly, guard the security of your mobile phone account as best you can (doing so might just save your life). The passwords for countless online services can be reset merely by entering a one-time code sent via text message to the phone number on file for the customer’s account.

And thanks to the increasing prevalence of a crime known as SIM swapping, thieves may be able to upend your personal and financial life simply by tricking someone at your mobile service provider into diverting your calls and texts to a device they control.

Most mobile providers offer customers the option of placing a PIN or secret passphrase on their accounts to lessen the likelihood of such attacks succeeding, but these protections also usually fail when the attackers are social engineering some $12-an-hour employee at a mobile phone store.

Your best option is to reduce your overall reliance on your phone number for added authentication at any online service. Many sites now offer MFA options that are app-based and not tied to your mobile service, and this is your best option for MFA wherever possible.

YOUR CREDIT FILES

First and foremost, all U.S. residents should ensure they have accounts set up online at the three major credit bureaus — Equifax, Experian and Trans Union.

It’s important to remember that the questions these bureaus will ask to verify your identity are not terribly difficult for thieves to answer or guess just by referencing public records and/or perhaps your postings on social media.

You will need accounts at these bureaus if you wish to freeze your credit file. KrebsOnSecurity has for many years urged all readers to do just that, because freezing your file is the best way to prevent identity thieves from opening new lines of credit in your name. Parents and guardians also can now freeze the files of their dependents for free.

For more on what a freeze entails and how to place or thaw one, please see this post. Beyond the big three bureaus, Innovis is a distant fourth bureau that some entities use to check consumer creditworthiness. Fortunately, filing a freeze with Innovis likewise is free and relatively painless.

It’s also a good idea to notify a company called ChexSystems to keep an eye out for fraud committed in your name. Thousands of banks rely on ChexSystems to verify customers who are requesting new checking and savings accounts, and ChexSystems lets consumers place a security alert on their credit data to make it more difficult for ID thieves to fraudulently obtain checking and savings accounts. For more information on doing that with ChexSystems, see this link.

If you placed a freeze on your file at the major bureaus more than a few years ago but haven’t revisited the bureaus’ sites lately, it might be wise to do that soon. Following its epic 2017 data breach, Equifax reconfigured its systems to effectively invalidate the freeze PINs it previously relied upon to unfreeze a file, effectively allowing anyone to bypass that PIN if they can glean a few personal details about you. Experian’s site also has undermined the security of the freeze PIN.

I mentioned planting your flag at the credit bureaus first because if you plan to freeze your credit files, it may be wise to do so after you have planted your flag at all the other places listed in this story. That’s because these other places may try to check your identity records at one or more of the bureaus, and having a freeze in place may interfere with that account creation.

YOUR FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS

I can’t tell you how many times people have proudly told me they don’t bank online, and prefer to manage all of their accounts the old fashioned way. I always respond that while this is totally okay, you still need to establish an online account for your financial providers because if you don’t someone may do it for you.

This goes doubly for any retirement and pension plans you may have. It’s a good idea for people with older relatives to help those individuals set up and manage online identities for their various accounts — even if those relatives never intend to access any of the accounts online.

This process is doubly important for parents and relatives who have just lost a spouse. When someone passes away, there’s often an obituary in the paper that offers a great deal of information about the deceased and any surviving family members, and identity thieves love to mine this information.

YOUR GOVERNMENT

Whether you’re approaching retirement, middle-aged or just starting out in your career, you should establish an account online at the U.S. Social Security Administration. Maybe you don’t believe Social Security money will actually still be there when you retire, but chances are you’re nevertheless paying into the system now. Either way, the plant-your-flag rules still apply.

Ditto for the Internal Revenue Service. A few years back, ID thieves who specialize in perpetrating tax refund fraud were massively registering people at the IRS’s website to download key data from their prior years’ tax transcripts. While the IRS has improved its taxpayer validation and security measures since then, it’s a good idea to mark your territory here as well.

The same goes for your state’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), which maintains an alarming amount of information about you whether you have an online account there or not. Because the DMV also is the place that typically issues state drivers licenses, you really don’t want to mess around with the possibility that someone could register as you, change your physical address on file, and obtain a new license in your name.

Last but certainly not least, you should create an account for your household at the U.S. Postal Service’s Web site. Having someone divert your mail or delay delivery of it for however long they like is not a fun experience.

Also, the USPS has this nifty service called Informed Delivery, which lets residents view scanned images of all incoming mail prior to delivery. In 2018, the U.S. Secret Service warned that identity thieves have been abusing Informed Delivery to let them know when residents are about to receive credit cards or notices of new lines of credit opened in their names.

YOUR HOME

Online accounts coupled with the strongest multi-factor authentication available also are important for any services that provide you with telephone, television and Internet access.

Strange as it may sound, plenty of people who receive all of these services in a bundle from one ISP do not have accounts online to manage their service. This is dangerous because if thieves can establish an account on your behalf, they can then divert calls intended for you to their own phones.

My original Plant Your Flag piece in 2018 told the story of an older Florida man who had pricey jewelry bought in his name after fraudsters created an online account at his ISP and diverted calls to his home phone number so they could intercept calls from his bank seeking to verify the transactions.

If you own a home, chances are you also have an account at one or more local utility providers, such as power and water companies. If you don’t already have an account at these places, create one and secure access to it with a strong password and any other access controls available.

These frequently monopolistic companies traditionally have poor to non-existent fraud controls, even though they effectively operate as mini credit bureaus. Bear in mind that possession of one or more of your utility bills is often sufficient documentation to establish proof of identity. As a result, such records are highly sought-after by identity thieves.

Another common way that ID thieves establish new lines of credit is by opening a mobile phone account in a target’s name. A little-known entity that many mobile providers turn to for validating new mobile accounts is the National Consumer Telecommunications and Utilities Exchange, or nctue.com. Happily, the NCTUE allows consumers to place a freeze on their file by calling their 800-number, 1-866-349-5355. For more information on the NCTUE, see this page.

Have I missed any important items? Please sound off in the comments below.

A Little Sunshine, annualcreditreport.com, ChexSystems, credit freeze, credit lock, credit monitoring, CreditKarma, Equifax, Experian, Innovis, NCTUE, optoutprescreen.com, security freeze, Security Tools, TransUnion

Credit Freezes are Free: Let the Ice Age Begin

It is now free in every U.S. state to freeze and unfreeze your credit file and that of your dependents, a process that blocks identity thieves and others from looking at private details in your consumer credit history. If you’ve been holding out because you’re not particularly worried about ID theft, here’s another reason to reconsider: The credit bureaus profit from selling copies of your file to others, so freezing your file also lets you deny these dinosaurs a valuable revenue stream.

Enacted in May 2018, the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act rolls back some of the restrictions placed on banks in the wake of the Great Recession of the last decade. But it also includes a silver lining. Previously, states could charge a confusing range of fees for placing, temporarily thawing or lifting a credit freeze. Today, those fees no longer exist.

A security freeze essentially blocks any potential creditors from being able to view or “pull” your credit file, unless you affirmatively unfreeze or thaw your file beforehand. With a freeze in place on your credit file, ID thieves can apply for credit in your name all they want, but they will not succeed in getting new lines of credit in your name because few if any creditors will extend that credit without first being able to gauge how risky it is to loan to you (i.e., view your credit file).

And because each credit inquiry caused by a creditor has the potential to lower your credit score, the freeze also helps protect your score, which is what most lenders use to decide whether to grant you credit when you truly do want it and apply for it.

To file a freeze, consumers must contact each of the three major credit bureaus online, by phone or by mail. Here’s the updated contact information for the big three:

Online: Equifax Freeze Page
By phone: 800-685-1111
By Mail: Equifax Security Freeze
P.O. Box 105788
Atlanta, Georgia 30348-5788

Online: Experian
By phone: 888-397-3742
By Mail: Experian Security Freeze
P.O. Box 9554, Allen, TX 75013

Online: TransUnion
By Phone: 888-909-8872
By Mail: TransUnion LLC
P.O. Box 2000 Chester, PA 19016

Spouses may request freezes for each other by phone as long as they pass authentication.

The new law also makes it free to place, thaw and lift freezes for dependents under the age of 16, or for incapacitated adult family members. However, this process is not currently available online or by phone, as it requires parents/guardians to submit written documentation (“sufficient proof of authority”), such as a copy of a birth certificate and copy of a Social Security card issued by the Social Security Administration, or — in the case of an incapacitated family member — proof of power of attorney.

In addition, the law requires the big three bureaus to offer free electronic credit monitoring services to all active duty military personnel. It also changes the rules for “fraud alerts,” which currently are free but only last for 90 days. With a fraud alert on your credit file, lenders or service providers should not grant credit in your name without first contacting you to obtain your approval — by phone or whatever other method you specify when you apply for the fraud alert.

Another important change: Fraud alerts now last for one year (previously they lasted just 90 days) but consumers can renew them each year. Bear in mind, however, that while lenders and service providers are supposed to seek and obtain your approval before granting credit in your name if you have a fraud alert on your file, they’re not legally required to do this.

MANAGING EXPECTATIONS

Having a freeze in place does nothing to prevent you from using existing lines of credit you may already have, such as credit, mortgage and bank accounts. By the same token, freezes do nothing to prevent crooks from abusing unauthorized access to these existing accounts.

According to experts, the bureaus make about $1 every time they sell access your credit file. However, a freeze on your file does nothing to prevent the bureaus from collecting information about you as a consumer — including your spending habits and preferences — and packaging, splicing and reselling that information to marketers.

When you place a freeze, each credit bureau will assign you a personal identification number (PIN) that needs to be supplied if and when you ever wish to open a new line of credit. When that time comes, consumers can temporarily thaw a freeze for a specified duration either online or by phone (see above resources). Needless to say, it’s a good idea to keep these PINs somewhere safe and reliable in the event you wish to unfreeze.

One important caveat: It’s best not to wait until the last minute before starting the freeze thawing process, which can be instantaneous or can take a few days. The easiest way to unfreeze your file for the purposes of gaining new credit is to spend a few minutes on the phone with the company from which you hope to gain the line of credit (or research the matter online) to see which credit bureau they rely upon for credit checks. It will most likely be one of the major bureaus. Once you know which bureau the creditor uses, contact that bureau either via phone or online and supply the PIN they gave you when you froze your credit file with them. The thawing process should not take more than 24 hours, but hiccups in the thawing process sometimes make things take longer.

CREDIT LOCKS AND CREDIT MONITORING

All three big bureaus tout their “credit lock” services as an easier and faster alternative to freezes — mainly because these alternatives aren’t as disruptive to their bottom lines. According to a recent post by CreditKarma.com, consumers can use these services to quickly lock or unlock access to credit inquiries, although some bureaus can take up to 48 hours. In contrast, they can take up to five business days to act on a freeze request, although in my experience the automated freeze process via the bureaus’ freeze sites has been more or less instantaneous (assuming the request actually goes through).

TransUnion and Equifax both offer free credit lock services, while Experian’s is free for 30 days and $19.99 for each additional month. However, TransUnion says those who take advantage of their free lock service agree to receive targeted marketing offers. What’s more, TransUnion also pushes consumers who sign up for its free lock service to subscribe to its “premium” lock services for a monthly fee with a perpetual auto-renewal.

Unsurprisingly, the bureaus’ use of the term credit lock has confused many consumers; this was almost certainly by design. But here’s one basic fact consumers should keep in mind about these lock services: Unlike freezes, locks are not governed by any law, meaning that the credit bureaus can change the terms of these arrangements when and if it suits them to do so.

If you have already signed up for credit monitoring services, placing a freeze on your file should not impact those services. However, it is generally not possible to sign up for new credit monitoring services once a freeze is in place. So if you wish to avail yourself of credit monitoring, it’s best to sign up before placing a freeze.

Many consumers erroneously believe that credit monitoring services will protect them from identity thieves. In truth, despite incessant marketing by the bureaus and others to the contrary, these services do not prevent thieves from using your identity to open new lines of credit, or from damaging your good name for years to come in the process. The most you can hope for is that credit monitoring services will alert you soon after an ID thief does steal your identity.

Credit monitoring services are principally useful in helping consumers recover from identity theft. Doing so often requires dozens of hours writing and mailing letters, and spending time on the phone contacting creditors and credit bureaus to straighten out the mess. In cases where identity theft leads to prosecution for crimes committed in your name by an ID thief, you may incur legal costs as well. Most of these services offer to reimburse you up to a certain amount for out-of-pocket expenses related to those efforts. But a better solution is to prevent thieves from stealing your identity in the first place by placing a freeze.

WHAT ELSE SHOULD YOU DO?

Freezing your credit file at the big three bureaus is a great start, but ID thieves can and do abuse other parts of the credit system to wreak havoc on consumers. Beyond the big three bureaus, Innovis is a distant fourth bureau that some entities use to check consumer creditworthiness. Fortunately, filing a freeze with Innovis also is free and relatively painless.

In addition, many wireless phone companies currently check consumer credit using a little-known credit reporting bureau operated by Equifax called the National Consumer Telecommunications and Utilities Exchange (NCTUE). Freezing your credit with Equifax won’t necessarily block inquiries to the NCTUE, but fortunately the NCTUE also offers a freeze process, as detailed in this story.

It’s a good idea to periodically order a free copy of your credit report. There are several forms of identity theft that probably will not be blocked by a freeze. But neither will they be blocked by a fraud alert or a credit lock. That’s why it’s so important to regularly review your credit file with the major bureaus for any signs of unauthorized activity.

By law, each of the three major credit reporting bureaus must provide a free copy of your credit report each year — but only if you request it via the government-mandated site annualcreditreport.com. The best way to take advantage of this right is to make a notation in your calendar to request a copy of your report every 120 days, to review the report and to report any inaccuracies or questionable entries when and if you spot them. Avoid other sites that offer “free” credit reports and then try to trick you into signing up for something else.

According to the Federal Trade Commission, having a freeze in place should not affect a consumer’s ability to obtain copies of their credit report from annualcreditreport.com.

It’s also a good idea to notify a company called ChexSystems to keep an eye out for fraud committed in your name. Thousands of banks rely on ChexSystems to verify customers that are requesting new checking and savings accounts, and ChexSystems lets consumers place a security alert on their credit data to make it more difficult for ID thieves to fraudulently obtain checking and savings accounts. For more information on doing that with ChexSystems, see this link.

Finally, ID thieves like to intercept offers of new credit and insurance sent via postal mail, so it’s a good idea to opt out of pre-approved credit offers. If you decide that you don’t want to receive prescreened offers of credit and insurance, you have two choices: You can opt out of receiving them for five years or opt out of receiving them permanently.

To opt out for five years: Call toll-free 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (1-888-567-8688) or visit optoutprescreen.com. The phone number and website are operated by the major consumer reporting companies. To complete your request for a permanent opt-out, you must return the signed Permanent Opt-Out Election form provided after you initiate your online request.

alex holden, CFPB, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, credit freeze, credit lock, CreditKarma, Equifax, Experian, Federal Trade Commission, FTC, Innovis, Lisa Holden, NCTUE, security freeze, Security Tools, The Coming Storm, TransUnion

In a Few Days, Credit Freezes Will Be Fee-Free

Later this month, all of the three major consumer credit bureaus will be required to offer free credit freezes to all Americans and their dependents. Maybe you’ve been holding off freezing your credit file because your home state currently charges a fee for placing or thawing a credit freeze, or because you believe it’s just not worth the hassle. If that accurately describes your views on the matter, this post may well change your mind.

A credit freeze — also known as a “security freeze” — restricts access to your credit file, making it far more difficult for identity thieves to open new accounts in your name.

Currently, many states allow the big three bureaus — Equifax, Experian and TransUnion — to charge a fee for placing or lifting a security freeze. But thanks to a federal law enacted earlier this year, after Sept. 21, 2018 it will be free to freeze and unfreeze your credit file and those of your children or dependents throughout the United States.

KrebsOnSecurity has for many years urged readers to freeze their files with the big three bureaus, as well as with a distant fourth — Innovis — and the NCTUE, an Equifax-operated credit checking clearinghouse relied upon by most of the major mobile phone providers.

There are dozens of private companies that specialize in providing consumer credit reports and scores to specific industries, including real estate brokers, landlords, insurers, debt buyers, employers, banks, casinos and retail stores. A handy PDF produced earlier this year by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) lists all of the known entities that maintain, sell or share credit data on U.S. citizens.

The CFPB’s document includes links to Web sites for 46 different consumer credit reporting entities, along with information about your legal rights to obtain data in your reports and dispute suspected inaccuracies with the companies as needed. My guess is the vast majority of Americans have never heard of most of these companies.

Via numerous front-end Web sites, each of these mini credit bureaus serve thousands or tens of thousands of people who work in the above mentioned industries and who have the ability to pull credit and other personal data on Americans. In many cases, online access to look up data through these companies is secured by nothing more than a username and password that can be stolen or phished by cybercrooks and abused to pull privileged information on consumers.

In other cases, it’s trivial for anyone to sign up for these services. For example, how do companies that provide background screening and credit report data to landlords decide who can sign up as a landlord? Answer: Anyone can be a landlord (or pretend to be one).

SCORE ONE FOR FREEZES

The truly scary part? Access to some of these credit lookup services is supposed to be secured behind a login page, but often isn’t. Consider the service pictured below, which for $44 will let anyone look up the credit score of any American who hasn’t already frozen their credit files with the big three. Worse yet, you don’t even need to have accurate information on a target — such as their Social Security number or current address.

KrebsOnSecurity was made aware of this particular portal by Alex Holden, CEO of Milwaukee, Wisc.-based cybersecurity firm Hold Security LLC [full disclosure: This author is listed as an adviser to Hold Security, however this is and always has been a volunteer role for which I have not be compensated].

Holden’s wife Lisa is a real estate agent, and as such she has access to a more full-featured version of the above-pictured consumer data lookup service (among others) for the purposes of helping clients determine a range of mortgage rates available. Mrs. Holden said the version of this service that she has access to will return accurate, current and complete credit file information on consumers even if one enters a made-up SSN and old address on an individual who hasn’t yet frozen their credit files with the big three.

“I’ve noticed in the past when I do a hard pull on someone’s credit report and the buyer gave me the wrong SSN or transposed some digits, not only will these services give me their credit report and full account history, it also tells you what their correct SSN is,” Mrs. Holden said.

With Mr. Holden’s permission, I gave the site pictured above an old street address for him plus a made-up SSN, and provided my credit card number to pay for the report. The document generated by that request said TransUnion and Experian were unable to look up his credit score with the information provided. However, Equifax not only provided his current credit score, it helpfully corrected the false data I entered for Holden, providing the last four digits of his real SSN and current address.

“We assume our credit report is keyed off of our SSN or something unique about ourselves,” Mrs. Holden said. “But it’s really keyed off your White Pages information, meaning anyone can get your credit report if they are in the know.”

I was pleased to find that I was unable to pull my own credit score through this exposed online service, although the site still charged me $44. The report produced simply said the consumer in question had requested that access to this information be restricted. But the real reason was simply that I’ve had my credit file frozen for years now.

Many media outlets are publishing stories this week about the one-year anniversary of the breach at Equifax that exposed the personal and financial data on more than 147 million people. But it’s important for everyone to remember that as bad as the Equifax breach was (and it was a total dumpster fire all around), most of the consumer data exposed in the breach has been for sale in the cybercrime underground for many years on a majority of Americans — including access to consumer credit reports. If anything, the Equifax breach may have simply helped ID thieves refresh some of those criminal data stores.

It costs $35 worth of bitcoin through this cybercrime service to pull someone’s credit file from the three major credit bureaus. There are many services just like this one, which almost certainly abuse hacked accounts from various industries that have “legitimate” access to consumer credit reports.

THE FEE-FREE FREEZE

According to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, when the new law takes effect on September 21, Equifax, Experian and TransUnion must each set up a webpage for requesting fraud alerts and credit freezes.

The law also provides additional ID theft protections to minors. Currently, some state laws allow you to freeze a child’s credit file, while others do not. Starting Sept. 21, no matter where you live you’ll be able to get a free credit freeze for kids under 16 years old.

Identity thieves can and often do target minors, but usually this type of fraud usually isn’t discovered until the affected individual tries to apply for credit for the first time, at which point it can be a long and expensive road to undo the mess. As such, I would highly recommend that readers who have children or dependents take full advantage of this offering once it’s available for free nationwide.

In addition, the law requires the big three bureaus to offer free electronic credit monitoring services to all active duty military personnel. It also changes the rules for “fraud alerts,” which currently are free but only last for 90 days. With a fraud alert on your credit file, lenders or service providers should not grant credit in your name without first contacting you to obtain your approval — by phone or whatever other method you specify when you apply for the fraud alert.

Under the new law, fraud alerts last for one year, but consumers can renew them each year. Bear in mind, however, that while lenders and service providers are supposed to seek and obtain your approval if you have a fraud alert on your file, they’re not legally required to do this.

A key unanswered question about these changes is whether the new dedicated credit bureau freeze sites will work any more reliably than the current freeze sites operated by the big three bureaus. The Web and social media are littered with consumer complaints — particularly over the past year — about the various freeze sites freezing up and returning endless error messages, or simply discouraging consumers from filing a freeze thanks to insecure Web site components.

It will be interesting to see whether these new freeze sites will try to steer consumers away from freezes and toward other in-house offerings, such as paid credit reports, credit monitoring, or “credit lock” services. All three big bureaus tout their credit lock services as an easier and faster alternative to freezes.

According to a recent post by CreditKarma.com, consumers can use these services to quickly lock or unlock access to credit inquiries, although some bureaus can take up to 48 hours. In contrast, they can take up to five business days to act on a freeze request, although in my experience the automated freeze process via the bureaus’ freeze sites has been more or less instantaneous (assuming the request actually goes through).

TransUnion and Equifax both offer free credit lock services, while Experian’s is free for 30 days and $19.99 for each additional month. However, TransUnion says those who take advantage of their free lock service agree to receive targeted marketing offers. What’s more, TransUnion also pushes consumers who sign up for its free lock service to subscribe to its “premium” lock services for a monthly fee with a perpetual auto-renewal.

Unsurprisingly, the bureaus’ use of the term credit lock has confused many consumers; this was almost certainly by design. But here’s one basic fact consumers should keep in mind about these lock services: Unlike freezes, locks are not governed by any law, meaning that the credit bureaus can change the terms of these arrangements when and if it suits them to do so.

If you’d like to go ahead with freezing your credit files now, this Q&A post from the Equifax breach explains the basics, and includes some other useful tips for staying ahead of identity thieves. Otherwise, check back here later this month for more details on the new free freeze sites.

A Little Sunshine, AT&T, California Utility Exchange, Carrie Kerskie, Centralized Credit Check Systems, Consumers Union, credit freeze, Equifax, Equifax Credit Information Services Inc, Equifax Information Services LLC, Experian, Google Chrome 66, Hodges University, Identity Fraud Institute, Innovis, National Consumer Telecommunications and Utilities Exchange, NCTUE, nctue.com, New York Data Exchange, security freeze, Symantec, Trans Union, Verizon

Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again.

I spent a few days last week speaking at and attending a conference on responding to identity theft. The forum was held in Florida, one of the major epicenters for identity fraud complaints in United States. One gripe I heard from several presenters was that identity thieves increasingly are finding ways to open new mobile phone accounts in the names of people who have already frozen their credit files with the big-three credit bureaus. Here’s a look at what may be going on, and how you can protect yourself.

Carrie Kerskie is director of the Identity Fraud Institute at Hodges University in Naples. A big part of her job is helping local residents respond to identity theft and fraud complaints. Kerskie said she’s had multiple victims in her area recently complain of having cell phone accounts opened in their names even though they had already frozen their credit files at the big three credit bureaus — Equifax, Experian and Trans Union (as well as distant fourth bureau Innovis).

The freeze process is designed so that a creditor should not be able to see your credit file unless you unfreeze the account. A credit freeze blocks potential creditors from being able to view or “pull” your credit file, making it far more difficult for identity thieves to apply for new lines of credit in your name.

But Kerskie’s investigation revealed that the mobile phone merchants weren’t asking any of the four credit bureaus mentioned above. Rather, the mobile providers were making credit queries with the National Consumer Telecommunications and Utilities Exchange (NCTUE), or nctue.com.

Source: nctue.com

“We’re finding that a lot of phone carriers — even some of the larger ones — are relying on NCTUE for credit checks,” Kerskie said. “It’s mainly phone carriers, but utilities, power, water, cable, any of those, they’re all starting to use this more.”

The NCTUE is a consumer reporting agency founded by AT&T in 1997 that maintains data such as payment and account history, reported by telecommunication, pay TV and utility service providers that are members of NCTUE.

Who are the NCTUE’s members? If you call the 800-number that NCTUE makes available to get a free copy of your NCTUE credit report, the option for “more information” about the organization says there are four “exchanges” that feed into the NCTUE’s system: the NCTUE itself; something called “Centralized Credit Check Systems“; the New York Data Exchange; and the California Utility Exchange.

According to a partner solutions page at Verizon, the New York Data Exchange is a not-for-profit entity created in 1996 that provides participating exchange carriers with access to local telecommunications service arrears (accounts that are unpaid) and final account information on residential end user accounts.

The NYDE is operated by Equifax Credit Information Services Inc. (yes, that Equifax). Verizon is one of many telecom providers that use the NYDE (and recall that AT&T was the founder of NCTUE).

The California Utility Exchange collects customer payment data from dozens of local utilities in the state, and also is operated by Equifax (Equifax Information Services LLC).

Google has virtually no useful information available about an entity called Centralized Credit Check Systems. It’s possible it no longer exists. If anyone finds differently, please leave a note in the comments section.

When I did some more digging on the NCTUE, I discovered…wait for it…Equifax also is the sole contractor that manages the NCTUE database. The entity’s site is also hosted out of Equifax’s servers. Equifax’s current contract to provide this service expires in 2020, according to a press release posted in 2015 by Equifax.

RED LIGHT. GREEN LIGHT. RED LIGHT.

Fortunately, the NCTUE makes it fairly easy to obtain any records they may have on Americans.  Simply phone them up (1-866-349-5185) and provide your Social Security number and the numeric portion of your registered street address.

Assuming the automated system can verify you with that information, the system then orders an NCTUE credit report to be sent to the address on file. You can also request to be sent a free “risk score” assigned by the NCTUE for each credit file it maintains.

The NCTUE also offers an online process for freezing one’s report. Perhaps unsurprisingly, however, the process for ordering a freeze through the NCTUE appears to be completely borked at the moment, thanks no doubt to Equifax’s well documented abysmal security practices.

Alternatively, it could all be part of a willful or negligent strategy to continue discouraging Americans from freezing their credit files (experts say the bureaus make about $1 for each time they sell your file to a potential creditor).

On April 29, I had an occasion to visit Equifax’s credit freeze application page, and found that the site was being served with an expired SSL certificate from Symantec (i.e., the site would not let me browse using https://). This happened because I went to the site using Google Chrome, and Google announced a decision in September 2017 to no longer trust SSL certs issued by Symantec prior to June 1, 2016.

Google said it would do this starting with Google Chrome version 66. It did not keep this plan a secret. On April 18, Google pushed out Chrome 66.  Despite all of the advance warnings, the security people at Equifax apparently missed the memo and in so doing probably scared most people away from its freeze page for several weeks (Equifax fixed the problem on its site sometime after I tweeted about the expired certificate on April 29).

That’s because when one uses Chrome to visit a site whose encryption certificate is validated by one of these unsupported Symantec certs, Chrome puts up a dire security warning that would almost certainly discourage most casual users from continuing.

The insecurity around Equifax’s own freeze site likely discouraged people from requesting a freeze on their credit files.

On May 7, when I visited the NCTUE’s page for freezing my credit file with them I was presented with the very same connection SSL security alert from Chrome, warning of an invalid Symantec certificate and that any data I shared with the NCTUE’s freeze page would not be encrypted in transit.

The security alert generated by Chrome when visiting the freeze page for the NCTUE, whose database (and apparently web site) also is run by Equifax.

When I clicked through past the warnings and proceeded to the insecure NCTUE freeze form (which is worded and stylized almost exactly like Equifax’s credit freeze page), I filled out the required information to freeze my NCTUE file. See if you can guess what happened next.

Yep, I was unceremoniously declined the opportunity to do that. “We are currently unable to service your request,” read the resulting Web page, without suggesting alternative means of obtaining its report. “Please try again later.”

The message I received after trying to freeze my file with the NCTUE.

This scenario will no doubt be familiar to many readers who tried (and failed in a similar fashion) to file freezes on their credit files with Equifax after the company divulged that hackers had relieved it of Social Security numbers, addresses, dates of birth and other sensitive data on nearly 150 million Americans last September. I attempted to file a freeze via the NCTUE’s site with no fewer than three different browsers, and each time the form reset itself upon submission or took me to a failure page.

So let’s review. Many people who have succeeded in freezing their credit files with Equifax have nonetheless had their identities stolen and new accounts opened in their names thanks to a lesser-known credit bureau that seems to rely entirely on credit checking entities operated by Equifax.

“This just reinforces the fact that we are no longer in control of our information,” said Kerskie, who is also a founding member of Griffon Force, a Florida-based identity theft restoration firm.

I find it difficult to disagree with Kerskie’s statement. What chaps me about this discovery is that countless Americans are in many cases plunking down $3-$10 per bureau to freeze their credit files, and yet a huge player in this market is able to continue to profit off of identity theft on those same Americans.

EQUIFAX RESPONDS

I asked Equifax why the very same credit bureau operating the NCTUE’s data exchange (and those of at least two other contributing members) couldn’t detect when consumers had placed credit freezes with Equifax. Put simply, Equifax’s wall of legal verbiage below says mainly that NCTUE is a separate entity from Equifax, and that NCTUE doesn’t include Equifax credit information.

Here is Equifax’s full statement on the matter:

·        The National Consumer Telecom and Utilities Exchange, Inc. (NCTUE) is a nationwide, member-owned and operated, FCRA-compliant consumer reporting agency that houses both positive and negative consumer payment data reported by its members, such as new connect requests, payment history, and historical account status and/or fraudulent accounts.  NCTUE members are providers of telecommunications and pay/satellite television services to consumers, as well as utilities providing gas, electrical and water services to consumers. 

·        This information is available to NCTUE members and, on a limited basis, to certain other customers of NCTUE’s contracted exchange operator, Equifax Information Services, LLC (Equifax) – typically financial institutions and insurance providers.  NCTUE does not include Equifax credit information, and Equifax is not a member of NCTUE, nor does Equifax own any aspect of NCTUE.  NCTUE does not provide telecommunications pay/ satellite television or utility services to consumers, and consumers do not apply for those services with NCTUE.

·        As a consumer reporting agency, NCTUE places and lifts security freezes on consumer files in accordance with the state law applicable to the consumer.  NCTUE also maintains a voluntary security freeze program for consumers who live in states which currently do not have a security freeze law. 

·        NCTUE is a separate consumer reporting agency from Equifax and therefore a consumer would need to independently place and lift a freeze with NCTUE.

·        While state laws vary in the manner in which consumers can place or lift a security freeze (temporarily or permanently), if a consumer has a security freeze on his or her NCTUE file and has not temporarily lifted the freeze, a creditor or other service provider, such as a mobile phone provider, generally cannot access that consumer’s NCTUE report in connection with a new account opening.  However, the creditor or provider may be able to access that consumer’s credit report from another consumer reporting agency in order to open a new account, or decide to open the account without accessing a credit report from any consumer reporting agency, such as NCTUE or Equifax. 

PLACING THE FREEZE

I was able to successfully place a freeze on my NCTUE report by calling their 800-number — 1-866-349-5355. The message said the NCTUE might charge a fee for placing or lifting the freeze, in accordance with state freeze laws.

Depending on your state of residence, the cost of placing a freeze on your credit file at Equifax, Experian or Trans Union can run between $3 and $10 per credit bureau, and in many states the bureaus also can charge fees for temporarily “thawing” and removing a freeze (according to a list published by Consumers Union, residents of four states — Indiana, Maine, North Carolina, South Carolina — do not need to pay to place, thaw or lift a freeze).

While my home state of Virginia allows the bureaus to charge $10 to place a freeze, for whatever reason the NCTUE did not assess that fee when I placed my freeze request with them. When and if your freeze request does get approved using the NCTUE’s automated phone system, make sure you have pen and paper or a keyboard handy to jot down the freeze PIN, which you will need in the event you ever wish to lift the freeze. When the system read my freeze PIN, it was read so quickly that I had to hit “*” on the dial pad several times to repeat the message.

It’s frankly absurd that consumers should ever have to pay to freeze their credit files at all, and yet a recent study indicates that almost 20 percent of Americans chose to do so at one or more of the three major credit bureaus since Equifax announced its breach last fall. The total estimated cost to consumers in freeze fees? $1.4 billion.

A bill in the U.S. Senate that looks likely to pass this year would require credit-reporting firms to let consumers place a freeze without paying. The free freeze component of the bill is just a tiny provision in a much larger banking reform bill — S. 2155 — that consumer groups say will roll back some of the consumer and market protections put in place after the Great Recession of the last decade.

“It’s part of a big banking bill that has provisions we hate,” said Chi Chi Wu, a staff attorney with the National Consumer Law Center. “It has some provisions not having to do with credit reporting, such as rolling back homeowners disclosure act provisions, changing protections in [current law] having to do with systemic risk.”

Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) has offered a bill (S. 2362) that would invert the current credit reporting system by making all consumer credit files frozen by default, forcing consumers to unfreeze their files whenever they wish to obtain new credit. Meanwhile, several other bills would impose slightly less dramatic changes to the consumer credit reporting industry.

Wu said that while S. 2155 appears steaming toward passage, she doubts any of the other freeze-related bills will go anywhere.

“None of these bills that do something really strong are moving very far,” she said.

I should note that NCTUE does offer freeze alternatives. Just like with the big four, NCTUE lets consumers place a somewhat less restrictive “fraud alert” on their file indicating that verbal permission should be obtained over the phone from a consumer before a new account can be opened in their name.

Here is a primer on freezing your credit file with the big three bureaus, including Innovis. This tutorial also includes advice on placing a security alert at ChexSystems, which is used by thousands of banks to verify customers that are requesting new checking and savings accounts. In addition, consumers can opt out of pre-approved credit offers by calling 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (1-888-567-8688), or visit optoutprescreen.com.

Oh, and if you don’t want Equifax sharing your salary history over the life of your entire career, you might want to opt out of that program as well.

Equifax and its ilk may one day finally be exposed for the digital dinosaurs that they are. But until that day, if you care about your identity you now may have another freeze to worry about. And if you decide to take the step of freezing your file at the NCTUE, please sound off about your experience in the comments below.