Equifax reported that there were a massive data breach that could impact 143 million customers in USA, Canada, and UK. Most of the affected customers are in USA only. The breach started in May 2017 and Equifax learned about this on July 29, 2017. Equifax is providing free credit monitoring for an year to all its customers. They claim that none of the credit related core database was hacked. But names, addresses, social security number, and date of birth data was stolen.
You can find more information at Equifax site dedicated to this breach:
You can start free credit monitoring immediately at the above site. However, this comes with a caveat that you can not file any case against Equifax and you’ll start getting billed after one year unless you cancel the service. So pay attention and read all finer prints before signing-up for the free service. A better approach for protecting yourself in future is to put a freeze on running your credit report at all three credit reporting agencies. It just costs $10 each but you’ll not have to pay any other money unless you want to freeze credit reporting again after lifting the freeze. Also visit Federal Trade Commission’s website, www.ftc.gov/idtheft to know more about protecting yourself from credit theft.