They Send You the Alarm. The Lock Is Also Free.

► The Identity Theft Resource Center counted `471` million breach notices in the first half of this year. All of 2025 produced `297.5` million. That is `58%` more, in half the time.

► There were `1,803` separate incidents in six months. All of last year had `3,321`. At this pace the record falls again.

► One in four breaches was AI-enabled between March 2025 and February 2026, up `56%` from the year before, according to IBM.

► Insiders stealing data from their own employer: `21` events in six months. All of 2025 had `3`. The group’s president put it plainly. They had never seen more than three in a single year.

► Here is the number nobody printed. Only `24%` of those notices told you what happened. In 2021 it was `93%`. The letters got louder and emptier at the same time, and that was a choice somebody made.

You cannot act on a letter that will not tell you anything. There are two very different situations hiding behind the same envelope. If they took a card number, that is a phone call and a new card in the mail. If they took your Social Security number and your date of birth, nobody can reissue those. Not ever.

Since the letter will not say which one it is, you have to assume the second one. That sounds dramatic until you notice how cheap the answer is.

A credit freeze costs nothing. It works at all three bureaus. It applies no matter what was taken, and it stops a lender opening an account in your name. The entire cost is inconvenience. You have to thaw it for a few days when you want a car loan or a new card. That is the whole downside.

I think the disclosure number is the real story here, not the breach count. Going from `93%` to `24%` is not a technology problem. Nobody got worse at knowing what was stolen. They got better at saying less, because saying more turned into lawsuits. Your letter is now written for a courtroom, not for you.

The second-order effect is stranger. What you get told depends on the state you live in, because the notification rules are written state by state. Same company, same breach, two neighbors across a state line, two different letters. The group tracking this said it directly: where you live determines whether you find out, and what you are told.

And look at what the letter offers you. A year of free credit monitoring. Monitoring is an alarm that rings after somebody has already opened an account in your name. A freeze is a lock that stops them opening it. Both cost nothing. They hand you the alarm.

If you have fifteen minutes: Freeze your credit at all three bureaus. Equifax, Experian, TransUnion. It is free. You have to do each one separately, because they will not do it for each other. Write the PINs on paper and keep them with the passport. Then pull all three reports at AnnualCreditReport.com. Free, once a week now, and it does not touch your score.

If a freeze is too much right now: Maybe you are shopping for a loan this month. Then put a fraud alert on instead. It makes a lender call you before approving anything in your name. Free, one phone call, and that bureau has to tell the other two. Weaker than a freeze. Far better than the drawer.

One more thing while you are in there. Do it for your spouse. And if you have a parent in their eighties, do theirs. They are the ones these people are actually hunting. My four letters are still in the drawer. The difference is that now the drawer is the only thing they can open.