Today, Equifax, one of the three major credit bureaus in the U.S. (and other countries), made major headlines after hackers stole sensitive data on 143 million U.S. residents from its database starting in May. Equifax did not discover the breach until July and only then began investigating the scale of the data leak. Because credit bureaus hold far more sensitive information than typical merchants or even banks, this hack is a major concern for everyone.

Stolen Data

According to reports, the data taken included SSNs (Social Security numbers), driver’s license numbers, dates of birth, addresses, credit card numbers, and more. With just this information, hackers can impersonate anyone to call banks, conduct transactions, and do many other things. This is extremely risky, involving not only potential financial loss but also online identity theft.

We recommend going to this site right away to check whether your information was stolen. If you were not affected, it will tell you there was no impact. Whether or not your data was affected, it will still provide a date to sign up for free credit monitoring.

Free Credit Monitoring

In response to this incident, Equifax is offering one year of credit protection to everyone, regardless of whether their information was stolen. After checking on that site whether your personal information was impacted, the results page will also provide a date. After that date, you can click here to enroll in free credit monitoring. We recommend that everyone sign up for this free service, whether or not they were affected. This was a serious breach, and no one should take it lightly.