Stopping someone opening accounts in your name

If your identity documents have been exposed — a breach, a stolen wallet, a scam where you sent a passport photo — the risk is not your existing accounts. It is new ones opened in your name.

Two protections exist in the UK, both cheap or free, and almost nobody knows about them.

CIFAS Protective Registration

CIFAS is the UK fraud prevention service, and protective registration places a flag against your name and address in the database that lenders check.

When someone applies for credit in your name, the flag tells the lender to carry out extra checks before approving. It does not stop you borrowing; it slows down anyone pretending to be you.

It costs a modest fee for two years, and it is free if you are a confirmed victim of identity fraud. Apply on the CIFAS website directly.

The trade-off, stated honestly: your own applications take longer and may involve more identity checks. If you are about to apply for a mortgage, factor that in. Otherwise it is a small cost for a real protection.

Your credit reports

Three agencies in the UK — Experian, Equifax and TransUnion — and they do not share data, so an account opened in your name may appear on one and not the others.

Check all three. Statutory reports are free, and several free services cover them:

• Experian — free account, or the statutory report
• Equifax — via ClearScore, free
• TransUnion — via Credit Karma, free

What you are looking for: accounts you do not recognise, searches from lenders you never applied to, addresses you have never lived at. A hard search you did not make is the earliest warning you will get.

Set up alerts on all three. They email when something changes, which turns a problem you find in six months into one you find in two days.

Notice of Correction

A free short statement added to your credit file, which lenders must read. Useful for explaining that you have been a victim of identity fraud and that applications should be checked carefully.

Free, and it stays until you remove it. It can slow automated decisions down, which is the point.

If it has already happened

1. Report to Action Fraud and keep the crime reference. 2. CIFAS protective registration — free for confirmed victims. 3. Contact every lender where an account was opened. They have fraud teams and this is routine for them. 4. Check all three credit files and dispute anything fraudulent. The agency has to investigate. 5. Change passwords on email and banking, from a device you trust.

What not to bother with

Paid credit monitoring. The free alerts from the three agencies do the same job. Paid monitoring detects fraud after it happens, which is what the free version also does.

Anyone who contacts you offering to fix it for a fee. Victim lists are sold, and a recovery approach after identity fraud is close to guaranteed. Everything on this page is free or nearly free and you can do it yourself.