Truston today announced MyTruston™ (http://www.mytruston.com), a free credit monitoring service designed to protect victims of identity theft.
MyTruston Protects Identity Theft Victims Without Putting Their Personal Information at Further Risk
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. – June 27, 2006 – Truston today announced MyTruston™ (http://www.mytruston.com), a free credit monitoring service designed to protect victims of identity theft. MyTruston is currently being offered to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to help veterans and military personnel recover from one of the nation's largest information security breaches. As the VA solicits bids from qualified companies to provide a comprehensive credit monitoring solution for victims, it is estimated that recovery costs for this data breach will cost the U.S. government $26.5 billion. If the VA selects MyTruston, this free service can help those affected while saving the government over a billion dollars.
MyTruston helps individuals monitor credit files for suspicious activity, while safeguarding personal information and providing an easy recovery from identify theft. As the only free credit monitoring service available, MyTruston eliminates the $150 per person annual costs associated with more traditional credit monitoring services without putting personal information—name, address, social security number and other confidential data—at risk. Since only an email address is required to use the service, MyTruston ensures that personal information is not put at further risk by forcing victims to hand over sensitive data.
“Helping victims easily detect and recover from identity theft is our primary concern,” said Tom Fragala, founder and CEO of Truston. “As an identity theft victim counselor, I am committed to securing sensitive personal data and providing services that alleviate the huge financial burden that too often result from detecting and recovering from identity theft. The Veterans Affairs data theft could ultimately cost taxpayers billions of dollars. The retail price for one year of credit monitoring for 26.5 million people is more than $3 billion dollars alone.”
In May 2006 the VA learned that an employee had a computer and hard drive stolen that stored information for 26.5 million individuals. This included all veterans and 2.2 million active-duty service members, reservists, and National Guard members. The data lost contained names, dates of birth, and social security numbers, putting all these individuals at serious risk of identity theft. On June 21, the VA announced its plans to provide one year of free credit monitoring to those affected. Without the use of a free credit monitoring service, the cost could be staggering. A bill introduced in the U.S. House, the Veterans Identity Protection Act of 2006 (HR 5455), authorized an appropriation of more than $1.25 billion to provide credit monitoring and free credit reports to victims.
“Truston will change the identity theft landscape through their revolutionary technology,” said Mike Arata, a certified fraud examiner and author of Preventing Identity Theft for Dummies.
MyTruston is scheduled to be generally available for the public in the third quarter of 2006.
About Truston
Truston is dedicated to helping victims deal with identity theft without putting personal information at risk. The company’s flagship product, MyTruston, is the only free online credit monitoring system available. In addition, Truston offers the only complete online ID theft recovery and prevention solution for safeguarding your good name. Private-label versions of Truston’s solutions are also available for customers and employees of government agencies, businesses and other organizations. For more information, visit http://www.trustoncorp.com or the Truston Identity Theft Blog at http://blog.trustoncorp.com/.
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