> They require you to pay money in order to stop doing something you never authorized or asked them to do - releasing your credit profile to anyone who asks. T

> They require you to pay money in order to stop doing something you never authorized or asked them to do - releasing your credit profile to anyone who asks. That's incorrect. CRAs can only release information to others if the requester has "permissible purpose". Under ordinary circumstances, that means you've asked the requester for some sort of service that allows them to pull your credit report. The purpose of a freeze is to prevent someone from trying to impersonate you and use your credit file. If you just want to be paranoid about it (or "proactive" if you prefer) then you can pay to have your file frozen and unlocked on demand. If you're already a victim of identity theft or legitimately expect to be, then you can get the freeze for free, I believe.