What it does: Goes beyond credit monitoring and fraud-alert placement services by doing some or all of the following: scanning public records for addresses, real estate, credit accounts, criminal records, and employers associated with your name and Social Security number; monitoring black-market Web sites, chat rooms, public records, and a database of applications for your credit-card account numbers or Social Security number; providing support or advice for removing your identifying information, where possible, and dealing with ID theft if the service doesn't prevent or detect fraud as promised.

What it costs: Services charge anywhere from $96 to $240 a year. But you can obtain much of what they provide yourself at no charge.

Should you do it? If you've taken the previous precautions, we see little reason to sign up for this costly protection. The monitoring of black-market Web sites is impressive. But what can you do if your SSN turns up on one? A sample "orange flag alert" sent to us by one service recommends little more than fraud alerts, credit freezes, and credit monitoring.

Where to get it: Identity Guard ($180 per year), IDSecure ($144 per year), Intelius IDWatch ($96 to $120 per year), IdentitySweep ($120 to $240 per year), and IdentityTruth ($120 per year), as well as many banks. But you can take these steps instead at no cost:


Beware: None of the fraud-prevention and detection sites that we examined promises to guard against fragmented credit-report files. Read the programs' fine print for disclaimers. IdentityGuard's fraud scan of unnamed "credit applications databases," for example, covers "many but not all accounts that could be opened in your name."

This article was also published in Consumer Reports Money Adviser. Subscribe now to get more expert financial advice you can trust.