The problem is, once something gets on your credit report, it can often be a hassle to get it off. And the onus is completely on you to do so. You end up play

The problem is, once something gets on your credit report, it can often be a hassle to get it off. And the onus is completely on you to do so. You end up playing phone tag, potentially for years, with the firm that opened the fraudulent account, as well as all the reporting agencies. So personally I feel it better to prevent the whole thing to begin with. Also I'm not familiar with those free credit monitoring apps, but it seems like in all likelihood a "free" credit monitoring app is going to sell your data...