Discover is now offering free identity theft alert services through any of their credit cards.  Discover monitors websites on the Dark Web where criminals buy and sell stolen credit cards, Social Security numbers and other identity theft information.  They will then alert their customers if it is found that their Social Security number or credit card has been compromised.  In addition, Discover will also monitor the customer’s Experian credit report and alert the customer if new accounts, such as credit cards, car loans or mortgages are taken out in the name of the customer.  Finally, Discover representatives will offer some guidance in remedying the problem if the customer does become a victim of identity theft.  All of these services are offered by Discover to its customers at no charge.
TIPS
While this is a very significant benefit to consumers and Discover should be applauded for its efforts, it should be noted that there are numerous other ways that identity theft is accomplished beyond those that Discover will be monitoring.  In addition, Discover will only be looking at the customer’s Experian credit report and not those of the other credit reporting agencies, TransUnion and Equifax.  Often problems may appear on one of these companies reports and not on the others.  Perhaps most importantly, like all credit monitoring services, these services do nothing to help prevent someone from becoming a victim of identity theft in the first place.  There are many things that people can do to help protect themselves from becoming a victim of identity theft, perhaps most strongly by putting a credit freeze on their credit reports at all three of the credit reporting agencies.  In my book “Identity Theft Alert” I list more than sixty simple things people can do to protect themselves from becoming a victim of identity theft.