Having a baby is wonderful news, but it can also be scary. Not only are you fully responsible for the welfare of your child, but it is also your duty as a parent to ensure that your child is protected in every way possible; This includes protecting your child’s credit. Identity thieves often target children because a child’s credit is not damaged (or does not really exist).

While you may think that the government protects children against this type of theft, this is not the case.

State level only

The only federal law created to protect a child’s credit identity is the ‘Law to Protect Children from Identity Theft’ (created in 2015), which is not a law at all. In fact, there is less than a 2% chance that this law will pass according to various sources. The law would allow parents to create a credit report for a child and then freeze that report to prevent identity theft. However, the law has not been signed by the president and does not seem to make it to his desk.

This has prompted several states to create similar laws at the state level, although not all states allow parents to create a credit report and freeze it. This is an important point. Recent media coverage of credit report freezes often leads people to believe that all states allow parents to create a credit report and then freeze it, but this is not true. Some states do not allow the creation and freezing of a credit report at all.

States that legally allow a freeze

There are only a handful of states that allow parents to create a credit report for a minor and then freeze that report. The states are Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin. Other states only allow parents to go through this process if a child is under the age of 16 (this is often not helpful, as identity theft happens to children much younger than 16).

Help from credit bureaus

Some credit bureaus have taken action. Equifax, for example, will allow parents of minors (regardless of the state they live in) to create and freeze a credit report. Trans Union allows parents to check for credit fraud and also allows parents to create and freeze a credit report if they reside in the states listed above. Some credit bureaus in states that do not have laws to deal with minor credit identity theft allow parents to create and freeze credit reports for a small fee; however, if a parent can prove fraud, that fee may waive.