Identity Guard Review - Best Identity Theft Protection

Affordable prices, available family protection, and top-notch artificial intelligence set Identity Guard apart from the pack in the identity theft protection industry.

The risks of falling victim to identity theft are higher than ever before, with an estimated 16,700,000 US victims of identity theft in 2017¹. As we do more of our business online – including shopping, banking, and loan applications – we must be wary of how much information we put out there, ready for a thief to snatch.

To help protect consumers against the potentially devastating consequences of identity theft, companies such as Identity Guard aim to alert their customers to unusual activity using their personal information.

Some reviewers do mention that Identity Guard’s abilities to help you in the event of identity theft are lax, especially when compared to some other competitors in the identity theft protection space. However, their range of services and affordable monthly plan prices make them an attractive choice for many people.

Identity Guard offers many of the services other firms offer, including dark web monitoring and address monitoring, but they go a little further. All Identity Guard customers have access to safe browsing tools, helping you proactively protect your personal information when doing business online.

If you’re looking for comprehensive identity theft protection at a good price, Identity Guard may be your top choice.

Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection: What You Need to Know

Identity Guard offers comprehensive identity theft protection monitoring services for a reasonable monthly price, which makes it attractive to those on a budget who still want protection.

Something that sets Identity Guard apart from its competitors is that it offers family identity theft monitoring at all levels of service. Some other companies that do offer family monitoring only provide it to the highest-paying customers. But with Identity Guard, even those at the lowest level of service can pay a little more each month and receive family monitoring.

Like many other identity theft and credit monitoring services, Identity Guard’s most comprehensive options are those which see you paying the most on a monthly basis.

Credit report monitoring, for example, is only available with the two higher tiers of service. If you’re looking for someone to monitor activity on your credit report, you’re going to need to pay for it either by paying Identity Guard more monthly or seeking out a separate credit monitoring company.

All Identity Guard customers receive access to safe browsing tools to help keep their transactions online safe from theft. Additionally, Identity Guard offers a mobile app so customers can manage their alerts and receive them instantly, whether they’re on the go or at home.

How Does Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection Work?

When you sign up for Identity Guard identity theft protection, you provide the company with some of your personal information. This may include your name, physical address, and social security number.

Identity Guard uses IBM Watson™ Artificial Intelligence to vigorously scan various sources of data, including the dark web, for mentions of your personal information. If they detect something strange or unusual about the activity they see, they can alert you to that activity.

You then can choose to act on that alert and move to protect your personal information, or ignore the alert if you are the one who initiated the change.

Identity Guard doesn’t provide you with much in the way of actual identity restoration services, as they just suggest steps you can take rather than being an active part of the process.

However, if you suffer financial loss as the result of identity theft, such as someone accessing your bank accounts, Identity Guard does offer up to $1 million** in compensation for such a theft.

If you choose the family plan, Identity Guard monitors all adults and their children in the household.

Children are increasingly becoming the victims of identity theft due to their clean credit history and the fact that parents aren’t likely to monitor their credit reports because they don’t anticipate any activity. This means identity theft of children can go undetected for years, potentially even until the child attempts to apply for loans for college or to purchase a house or car in early adulthood.

All customers can access their immediate alerts through Identity Guard’s mobile app, meaning you get notified as soon as something changes so you can take quick action.

Where is Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection Available?

Identity Guard is available in all 50 US States.

How Much Does Identity Guard Cost?

How much Identity Guard’s services cost depends on the level of service you choose, whether you opt for family coverage, and whether you elect to pay on a monthly or annual basis.

Individual plans range from $8.99 to $24.99 per month when billed monthly, and you receive a 17 percent discount if you choose to pay annually instead. This puts plans between $7.50 and $20.83 per month.

Family plans are priced from between $14.99 and $34.99 monthly, or between $12.50 and $29.17 per month when paid annually.

What Does Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection Cover?

Identity Guard’s identity theft protection services cover a variety of types of monitoring and other services. Some of the available services include:

Stolen Funds Reimbursement

If your identity gets stolen and you suffer a financial loss as the result of that theft, Identity Guard provides up to $1 million in reimbursement for those costs.

This can include legal fees, lost wages, travel expenses, and child care costs related to dealing with your identity theft case and trying to restore your stolen identity.

Dark Web Monitoring

There is a lot of information bought and sold on the dark web, and people’s personal information is a big part of that trade. Thieves often visit the dark web to purchase stolen personal information so they may open new credit card accounts, apply for loans, steal money, or use that personal information when committing a crime.

Unless you know how to access and navigate the dark web, keeping tabs on whether or not your information is there can be nearly impossible.

Identity Guard uses IBM Watson Artificial Intelligence to scan the dark web for mentions of your information, alerting you if anything is found.

High-Risk Transaction Alerts

Over time, Identity Guard gets to know the typical pattern of transactions that hit your credit report or other financial accounts. If they notice something that looks out-of-the-ordinary, such as a large purchase or a purchase originating in a foreign country.

They then can notify you of these transactions so you can respond if necessary, minimizing the risk to your finances.

Credit Monitoring

Changes to your credit score may not be noticeable until you decide to run your credit report.

However, if a criminal has your information and is making unauthorized charges or has attempted to take out loans in your name, much of the damage can be done long before you ever noticed.

With Identity Guard’s two higher-tiered plans, you receive monitoring of your credit activity with all three bureaus, as well as access to your credit score*.

Identity Guard leads the industry with near real-time alert speeds, and also is the only service with direct relationships with all three major credit bureaus².

Financial Account Monitoring

Identity theft also can involve stealing your money, such as changing the contact information on your bank account or directly transferring money out.

Identity Guard provides monitoring of your financial accounts for unusual activity, and they can alert you in the event that they see something strange happening so you can take action.

Safe Browsing Extension

Any time you enter personal information into websites, including your passwords, address, and credit card number, thieves may be able to access that information and could use it to steal your identity.

With its safe browsing extension, Identity Guard aims to help you prevent identity theft before it even starts, giving you a safer, more secure way of browsing the internet and protecting you from getting your identity stolen.

Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection Features

• Founded in 1996
• A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau
• Prompt notifications by phone, email, text, or in the app
• Wide variety of monitoring available
• Affordable monthly pricing
• Discounts for paying annually
• $1 million in identity theft insurance
• Family plans available at all pricing levels
• Uses IBM Watson Artificial Intelligence for identity theft monitoring
• Offers both identity theft monitoring and credit monitoring with higher-tier plans

Pros and Cons of Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection

Here are some of the pros and cons of choosing Identity Guard for identity theft protection:

Pros

• More than 20 years in business
• A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau
• Affordable monthly plans
• Discounts for paying annually
• Family identity theft monitoring available
• Uses IBM Watson Artificial Intelligence to scan for your personal information
• Safe browser extension helps you prevent identity theft before it happens
• Convenient mobile app gives you immediate alerts
• Offers both identity theft monitoring and credit monitoring
• $1 million in identity theft insurance to help cover lost wages, legal fees, and more

Cons

• Complete monitoring available only with higher-paid plans
• Some reviewers report receiving a high volume of emails

Discounts on Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection

Identity Guard offers a 17 percent discount for customers who elect to pay a year’s worth of services in full instead of being billed monthly.

Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection Customer Reviews

With more than 20 years in business, Identity Guard has collected a variety of customer reviews, both positive and negative. However, the number of customer reviews is much lower than with other companies, making it difficult to fully evaluate the service.

On ConsumerAffairs.com, for example, Identity Guard has 29 customer reviews for a total star rating of 4 out of 5.

Happy customers point to the speed with which Identity Guard notifies them of problems as helping them act quickly to protect their personal information.

“ID Guard notified me of a new credit card being taken out. I checked it out and found that some low-life used my S.S number to open a new credit card using a fake address. I immediately put a red flag on any new credit cards or applications in my name and S.S. number. I filed a police report and called the company (G.E. Credit Co) and complained, but they would not give me any information on the person who filed the application.” - Brian

“I chose Identity Guard because it had a 30 day trial and the customer reviews were high in ranking. This company has the first IBM Watson protection that gives this company an advantage over others. They have a variety of products to fit your needs such as individual, family and children plans. It also has a 1 million insurance policy when you subscribe to Identity Guard. They are a more diverse company than any other company and have the most innovative technology for customers to keep their personal information safe and discreet.

How to Purchase Identity Guard Identity Theft Protection

1. Visit www.identityguard.com.
2. Select your level of service, whether you want individual or family coverage, and whether you want to be billed annually or monthly.
3. Provide Identity Guard with some of your personal information, as well as the credit card you wish to be billed for service.

How to Contact Identity Guard

Address: 3901 Stonecraft Boulevard Chantilly, VA 20151 Customer Service: (855) 443-7748 Email Support: [email protected] Website: https://www.identityguard.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IdentityGuard/ Twitter: @identityg YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBD8UtzKx4wFnS3dR7DQqng

Does Identity Guard Offer Other Kinds of Services?

Identity Guard only offers identity theft monitoring and credit monitoring services.

Summary

Protecting yourself from identity theft is very important, as more of our lives are spent doing business online.

With Identity Guard, you get artificial intelligence-powered monitoring of your personal information and credit report, and are alerted promptly if they detect a problem.

While Identity Guard doesn’t provide you with actual hands-on help in the event that your personal information is stolen, they can help you respond quickly if your information is stolen to minimize the damage.

Identity Guard has a few unique features that make it stand out from the crowd.

First, it uses IBM Watson™ Artificial Intelligence to scan for mentions of your personal information, providing one of the most comprehensive and accurate scans in the industry.

Additionally, Identity Guard offers family identity theft monitoring plans at all levels of service for affordable prices, something that’s valuable for families and isn’t offered at other companies.

Identity Guard also provides high-quality service at affordable prices, giving more people access to their service regardless of how much they are able to spend each month.

• The score you receive with Identity Guard is provided for educational purposes to help you understand your credit. It is calculated using the information contained in your TransUnion credit file. Lenders use many different credit scoring systems, and the score you receive with Identity Guard is not the same score used by lenders to evaluate your credit.

• Identity Theft Insurance underwritten by insurance company subsidiaries or affiliates of American International Group‚ Inc. The description herein is a summary and intended for informational purposes only and does not include all terms‚ conditions and exclusions of the policies described. Please refer to the actual policies for terms‚ conditions‚ and exclusions of coverage. Coverage may not be available in all jurisdictions.