WellPoint Data Breach Due to Carelessness

Surprise, surprise. A company has giant data breach due to negligent security, but not to worry! They'll protect you by offering you credit monitoring for one year free!

It would be nice if people could spot this B.S. easily by now, but I'm guessing there are a lot that won't so let me spell it out. Credit monitoring is a waste of your time and is likely only offered to make it seem like they're doing something for you when they probably don't. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that the credit monitoring companies have a "data breach plan" where companies can get a bulk discount by offering monitoring to all their victims.

It's a classic win-win-lose. The breach company wins PR points, the monitoring companies continue to make money for not providing any real service, and we all lose.

If you're worried about id theft, just freeze your credit reports!