Early Retirement Extreme Forums

I've been researching and while everyone seems to recommend a freeze, an alert seems better in many regards.

Following are my comparisons of security:

Freeze cons relative to alert:
*Does not protect against opening accounts with creditors who already have accessed credit in past
*Costs money and time with 3-8 companies depending on how specific you want to get (bypassed if you even miss 1 company)
*Grossly inconvenient whenever you want to access credit (costs money and time)

Fraud Alert pros:
*Free set up in minutes with one company and comprehensive alert established
*Requires 2 step verification to open credit regardless of whether established creditor or new creditor (always alerts and confirms)
*Doesn't derail any credit opening
Cons:
*Re-establish every 90 days

So fraud alert + monitor all accounts and credit to be thorough seems more effective than a freeze for maintaining account integrity.

There's also an extended Fraud Alert that's good for 7 years if you're willing to do the paperwork.

I thought fraud alerts, when made to one of big 3, only went to the other big 3. They go to the smaller ones also? Source?