Fake Credit Report Sites Aim to Scam

Consumers are routinely advised to review their credit reports regularly for signs of identity theft and other fraud. According to a new report from the World Privacy Forum, however, careless attempts to obtain your credit report online can cost you a bundle — and may even make you a victim of the very crime you were trying to avoid.

Under a provision of the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (or FACT Act), U.S. consumers have the right to one free credit report per year from each of the three national credit reporting agencies (CRAs) — TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax. But with millions of Americans trying to make their way to AnnualCreditReport.com, the official web site set up for this purpose by the three CRAs, scammers have smelled an opportunity. According to Pam Dixon, head of the World Privacy Forum and author of the new report, impostor sites created to capture unwary consumers are springing up like mushrooms.

Many of these imposter sites include words like "annual," "credit," "report," and "free" in their domain names to capitalize on consumer confusion. Others have names that are one typo away from the web address of the authentic site. Either way, consumers who end up at one of these bogus sites may not realize it isn't the real deal until it's too late. These imposter sites — like the fake corporate sites use in phishing scams to extract identity and account data from unwary customers — tend to be either close approximations or out-and-out clones of the authentic credit report site, showing no obvious signs of their counterfeit status.

What's more, says Dixon's report, these fake sites are getting easier and easier to find. According to Dixon, the number of imposter sites has more than doubled in just four months. In February 2005, World Privacy Forum researchers found 50 active domains devoted to the scam; by June, that figure had risen to 112 — a 124 percent increase.

While different scam sites have different aims, the most malign — those that try to trick visitors into entering their Social Security numbers and other identity information — can make their victims' lives a real nightmare, plunging them into the purgatory of true identity theft. Others are so-called "link farms" that lure visitors into paying for credit products and services in lieu of the free credit report originally sought by the user. Some even forward visitors directly to data brokers. Exploiting consumers' innocence to extract sensitive information is made even easier by the visitors' original goal — since they are, after all, trying to obtain a credit report, and expect to be asked for personal information as part of that process.

As the report explains, "What is unique about the AnnualCreditReport.com site is that tens of millions of consumers may potentially access the official site once per year, every year. These consumers are accessing the site prepared and willing to enter their Social Security numbers and other higher personal data in order to get a credit report."

To avoid being caught up in this scam, the reports suggests that consumers may want to obtain their free credit report by telephone, using the toll-free number (877-322-8228). Alternatively, consumers can request their free credit report by postal mail.