Not very secure.īut the company says it's learning as it goes along, and working quickly to make changes. And, most interestingly, instead of randomly generated PINs, early PIN codes appeared to be simply the date and time you applied for a PIN. Others said the automated freezing line wasn't working. Equifax customers reported reaching call center employees who didn't know what a 'credit freeze' was. Since the announcement of the hack and even up to now there have been problems with the freezes. It can also put a crimp in those spur-of-the-moment store credit offers where you get a percentage off your purchase for signing up on the spot. But it's also somewhat of a hassle - so if you're shopping for a car or house, you'll want to leave the freeze off for a while. The Disadvantagesįreezing your credit is a great way to stop thieves or computer errors from messing up your credit history. The FTC has more info on how credit freezes work as well. After you thaw the report and are done with the transaction, you call the credit bureau back and put the freeze back on. The whole process takes about 15 minutes. To thaw it, you can call a phone number (Equifax's automated freeze lift line is 1-80) and give them the PIN along with either the date range you wanted the freeze lifted, or the name of the company you'd like to be given access to your report.

This means that any time you or any other entity - legitimate or otherwise - tries to check your credit and open up a new line of credit, you'll need to first 'thaw' your credit report.

Lift security freeze equifax