I'm in my 40s, and when I was growing up and through the beginning of my adulthood, the pinnacle of protecting one's finances and identity was to safeguard the Social Security Number. We all were taught, don't give out your SSN and protect it because that's the proverbial key to your financial kingdom. Be wary of who asks you for it, it was said. Never give it out over the telephone, we were taught. If someone unscrupulous got ahold of it, it would be a disaster.
Now fast-forward 20 years and I think this is no longer good advice. Sure, if someone unscrupulous gets ahold of your Social Security Number, maybe they could make a big mess. But what's different now is that, we individually no longer have any effective control over who has that information. Our personal data is shared with anyone who wants it. They store it, sell it, share it, slice it, dice it – almost always without our knowledge or consent. And when it changes hands, we almost never get a say in it.
There's no use in waiting for someone, or a gov't/regulatory agency, coming to save us. They don't care enough about consumers and constituents to upset wealthy businesses who take part in this circle. Anyone with any influence or authority doesn't have enough motivation to stick up for us.
So we have to take it upon ourselves to protect ourselves, with the meager tools we have. And the concept of protecting that small string of numbers still remains the same. However, it's not one's SSN that should be the recipient of our protection anymore. It's the freeze/unfreeze PINs that the borrowing bureaus issue when a borrowing report is frozen.
I believe that all persons with a Social Security Number should keep their borrowing reports frozen with all 3 of the major borrowing bureaus at all times. When the freeze is initially implemented, the consumer is issued a PIN that's used to temporarily unfreeze (used in advance of when the consumer is legitimately applying for new borrowing) or permanently unfreeze (I don't know why a person would want to do this) the borrowing report. This is the number that should be protected at all costs.
The process is a lot easier than it used to be. Now, it's free and automated. Two of the 3 major bureaus allow the consumer to create/manage the borrowing freeze on their website. One requires a telephone call to an automated system. It take 10 minutes, and can potentially save the consumer from falling prey to a serious situation. It's practically impossible for anyone to pull a borrowing report (using a hard pull), and therefore consider any application for borrowing, when a borrowing freeze is in place. And 'frozen' should be the default status of everyone's borrowing files.
Transunion Security Freeze site
Please feel free to correct any facts that I misstated.