Track Fraudulent Use of Your Social Security Number With Capital One Credit Wise Tool
Capital One’s Credit Wise , a free loan tracking tool, will now alert you if and when someone uses your Social Security number to apply for a new line of credit or open another financial account.
Anyone can use the service, which is available online and as a separate app for iOS and Android , whether you have a Capital One account or not. It also tracks your credit reports from Experian and Transunion and will notify you if there are changes and alert you if your email or SSN is found on the Dark Web.
Other companies offer similar services, but often for a price or for their members (for example, Discover offers free FICO scores for everyone, but leaves it up to cardholders to track the SSN).
Credit Wise also suggests steps you need to take to improve your rating and lets you know how you are performing on various credit factors such as account history and credit utilization.
One glitch: It would be nice if the Credit Wise app required a PIN to access, like some other financial apps that also track your grades and reports. But tracking a user’s SSN for free is a nice bonus.
Bug Fix: Friday Jul 13, 2018: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that the NerdWallet app requires a PIN to access.