Identity theft costs in Canada, an Equifax and TransUnion price guide

What to take away

• A privacy scam rarely produces one clean loss figure, because a Canadian household absorbs replacement costs, lost hours and higher borrowing rates on top of whatever was taken.
• Equifax Canada and TransUnion Canada both sell tiered credit monitoring, and the higher tiers add identity theft insurance and restoration help rather than better detection.
• Every Canadian can order a free credit report by mail or phone from both bureaus, and both accept fraud alerts at no charge.
• A fraud alert asks lenders to verify before extending credit, while a credit freeze blocks new credit applications outright; the two are not the same tool.
• Paid monitoring earns its fee when you have already been breached or need restoration support, and free checks cover most other households.
• Watch the contract: monthly tiers renew automatically and refunds are limited, so read the cancellation clause before you pay.

What identity theft actually costs a Canadian household

Start with what is not on the statement. A stolen card number is refunded by the issuer once you report it.

The damage that lingers is administrative: hours on the phone, replacement of identification, and a credit file that carries a fraudulent tradeline for months.

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada treats identity theft as a privacy problem first. Its guidance on identity and verification sits alongside breach reporting rather than consumer finance.

That framing matters when you decide what to buy. You are paying to shorten the discovery window, not to prevent the theft.

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada publishes plain guidance on identity theft and verification, which is the closest thing Canada has to a national reference on the subject.

Some losses are large and structural. Mortgage fraud is the clearest example: a fraudster uses your name and documents to obtain financing against a property.

Unwinding it involves a lender, a lawyer and a title insurer. CMHC's mortgage fraud page sets out how that exposure arises and why lenders now verify income and identity more aggressively.

For most households the realistic exposure is smaller and more annoying. A fraudulent phone account, a payday loan in your name, a tax filing you did not make. Each one costs hours, and the hours are the cost.

The costs that do not appear on a statement

• Hours spent on hold with a bank, a bureau and a telecom provider
• Replacement fees for a driver's licence or health card
• Postage and courier costs for mailed credit report requests
• Higher interest on a mortgage or car loan while a dispute is open
• Time away from work, which is unpaid for most people

A Social Insurance Number is the item that turns a nuisance into a long project. Service Canada issues SINs, and a compromised SIN can be used to file a return or take employment in your name.

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada's guidance on SINs and driver's licences explains why those two documents carry outsized weight in identity theft cases.

If your SIN or a comparable national identifier has been exposed, the first steps are procedural rather than financial. Our guide to SSN stolen what to do walks through the sequence US residents follow, and the Canadian version is structurally similar: report, document, then monitor.

Equifax Canada credit monitoring: current price tiers

Equifax Canada sells monitoring in tiers, and the differences between them are mostly about insurance and human help rather than detection quality. All tiers watch the same Equifax file.

Pricing changes, and Equifax runs promotions that cut the first year. Treat any figure you see as a starting point and confirm it at checkout, because the renewal rate is the number that matters.

Tier	What it adds	Who it suits
Basic monitoring	Credit report access, score, alerts on key changes to your Equifax file	People who want a score and alerts and nothing else
Mid tier	Both bureau reports, more frequent score updates, darker web monitoring	Households that want one dashboard for two files
Top tier	Identity theft insurance, restoration case manager, alerts across more data types	Anyone already dealing with a fraud file

The insurance is the headline at the top tier, and it is worth reading the certificate before you count on it. Coverage usually reimburses specific out of pocket costs up to a cap, with exclusions, and it is not a cash payout for distress.

Restoration support is the part people actually use. A case manager who has done this before can compress weeks of phone calls into days, which is the real product at the top tier.

Equifax Canada also sells a one bureau product that is cheaper and, for many readers, sufficient. If you bank and borrow with institutions that report to both bureaus, a single file view leaves a blind spot. That is the trade you are making.

What the Equifax tiers do not include

They do not include your TransUnion file unless you buy the tier that says so. They do not stop a lender from opening an account. They do not remove a fraudulent tradeline; only a dispute does that.

TransUnion Canada credit monitoring: current price tiers

TransUnion Canada structures its consumer products in a similar ladder, and the same logic applies: lower tiers inform you, higher tiers insure and assist you.

TransUnion's consumer offering in Canada has historically centred on a credit score product with monitoring add ons, plus a more expensive identity protection package with insurance and restoration. Names and prices shift, so check the current page rather than trusting a figure from a comparison site.

One practical difference is how each bureau presents alerts. Equifax tends to push alerts on hard inquiries and new accounts; TransUnion's consumer app leans on score change notifications. Both are useful, and neither is a substitute for reading your full report.

If you want to understand what a genuine verification request looks like before you respond to one, our canadian anti-fraud centre report scam guide sets out the tells that separate a real lender from an imitation.

Reading the tiers side by side

1. List what you actually need: alerts, both files, insurance, or human help.
2. Buy the cheapest tier that covers that list at one bureau.
3. Add the second bureau only if you have borrowings that report there.
4. Diarize the renewal date and the price you agreed to.
5. Reassess after twelve months, because your circumstances change and the promotional rate does not last.

Both bureaus are credit reporting agencies regulated at the provincial level in some provinces, and both must give you your file on request. That obligation is the floor under every paid product they sell.

Free alternatives: annual credit reports and fraud alerts

Canadians do not need a subscription to see their credit file. Equifax Canada and TransUnion Canada both provide a free annual credit report by mail, and both operate automated phone lines that mail a report to you.

The mail route is slower, often a few weeks, and it asks for copies of two pieces of identification. It is also free, which makes it the correct starting point for anyone whose main worry is a privacy scam that has not yet produced a visible loss.

A fraud alert is the second free tool. You contact a bureau, explain that you are a victim or a likely target of fraud, and it flags your file so lenders are expected to take extra steps before extending credit. Both bureaus accept these requests, and there is no charge.

Free tools are not inferior versions of paid ones. They are the same data, delivered less often and without insurance.

Ordering a free report without paying a fee

• Go to the bureau's Canadian site and find the mail or phone request route, not the trial offer
• Have two pieces of identification ready to photocopy
• Send the request by tracked mail if you want proof of the date
• Expect the report in weeks, not days
• Repeat with the second bureau, because the files differ

Be careful with search results. Many sites that rank for credit report Canada are lead generators that sign you up for a paid trial.

The bureau's own request page is the one you want. If you would rather run a structured check of your own accounts first, the free tools in our roundup of privacy checkup tools cover much of the same ground.

What fraud alerts and credit freezes do, and what they do not

A fraud alert is a request for caution. It tells a lender that your file is sensitive and that it should verify identity before approving credit. It does not block anything, and a determined fraudster with good forged documents can still get through.

A credit freeze is stronger. Where available, it restricts access to your credit file so that most lenders cannot pull it, which effectively stops new credit applications.

In Canada, freeze style products are offered by the bureaus as consumer features rather than as a statutory right in every province, so availability and mechanics vary.

Neither tool fixes a fraudulent account that already exists. That requires a dispute, and a dispute requires evidence: a police report number, a copy of the fraudulent statement, or correspondence showing you never held the account.

If you are weighing a paid monitoring subscription against a free freeze, our breakdown of the facebook marketplace interac e-transfer scam looks at what each category actually detects and what it misses.

Limits worth knowing before you rely on either

A fraud alert expires and must be renewed. A freeze can complicate your own legitimate applications, and you will need to lift it temporarily, which takes time. Neither tool covers a SIN being used for employment or tax purposes, because those checks do not run through the credit bureaus.

Reading the fine print: contract terms and cancellation

Credit monitoring in Canada is sold on subscription, and the terms are where the money is. Three clauses decide whether the product is good value for you.

The first is the renewal price. Promotional first year pricing is common, and the standard rate applies automatically after it. Note the date and the amount.

The second is the cancellation window. Some products require notice before the renewal date, and some bill annually with no partial refund. If you cancel a week late, you may have paid for another year.

The third is the insurance certificate. Read the exclusions: pre existing incidents, claims below a deductible, and losses that are not out of pocket expenses are commonly excluded. The document is short, and it changes what the top tier is worth.

Consumer protection in Canada sits across federal and provincial regulators, and the Competition Bureau Canada takes an interest in deceptive marketing claims, including those made by service providers. If a monitoring product promises to stop identity theft outright, that claim deserves scepticism.

A worked example

Priya in Brampton gets a call from someone claiming to be her bank, gives a one time code, and later finds a fraudulent phone account in her name. She orders free reports from both bureaus by mail, files a fraud alert with each, and disputes the phone account with the provider and the bureau.

Total cash outlay: postage and a police report, under fifty dollars. Total time: about nine hours across three weeks. She does not buy monitoring, because the fraud is known and being disputed. What she does buy, six months later, is a freeze style product after a second attempt on her file.

That sequence is typical. Free tools handle discovery and dispute. Paid tools earn their place when you want the file locked down or you want someone else making the calls.

Choosing between paid monitoring and free checks

Buy monitoring if you have already been breached, if your SIN or a mortgage application is in play, or if you would rather pay than spend evenings on hold. The restoration element is the part that justifies the top tiers.

Stay free if your concern is general. Order both reports once a year, keep an eye on your bank statements, and set a fraud alert if something feels wrong. That covers the majority of Canadian households.

A middle path works for many readers: free reports plus a single mid tier subscription that covers both bureaus, cancelled at the renewal date if it has not been used.

For a wider look at what a routine check should include, our briefing on identity verification sets out how organizations are expected to confirm identity and where those checks fail.

Whatever you choose, the underlying discipline is the same. Know which bureaus hold your file, and know how to reach them without a search engine.

Know what you will do in the first hour after a bad call. The Bank of Canada's financial education resources cover fraud prevention basics that apply to these decisions.

The federal Money and finances portal collects the consumer finance context in one place.

A cost comparison table for Canadian consumers

Prices move, so the table below compares what each option gives you rather than quoting a number that may be stale by the time you read it.

Option	Cost	Covers	Best for
Free annual credit report, one bureau	None	One file, by mail or phone	Routine annual checks
Free annual credit report, both bureaus	None	Both files	Anyone starting a dispute
Fraud alert	None	Flags your file for lenders	Suspected fraud, no confirmed loss
Credit freeze style product	Varies by bureau	Restricts file access	Confirmed fraud, repeated attempts
Equifax Canada basic monitoring	Monthly fee	One file, score, alerts	Score tracking
Equifax Canada top tier	Higher monthly fee	Both files, insurance, restoration	Active fraud cases
TransUnion Canada monitoring	Monthly fee	TransUnion file, score, alerts	TransUnion borrowers
TransUnion Canada identity package	Higher monthly fee	Insurance and restoration	Households wanting help

Read the table as a map of what you are buying, not a price list. The gap between free and paid is not detection quality. It is frequency, insurance and human assistance.

One more Canadian detail: your file at each bureau is separate, and a lender may report to only one. Checking a single bureau and assuming the other is clean is the most common mistake readers make after a privacy scam.

Common questions

Is a free credit report in Canada really free? Yes, when you request it by mail or through the bureau's automated phone line. The free trial offers you see in search results are paid subscriptions with a cancellation requirement.

Does a fraud alert stop someone opening credit in my name? It makes a lender take extra verification steps, but it does not block the application. A credit freeze style product is the stronger option where it is available.

Should I pay for Equifax Canada and TransUnion Canada at the same time? Only if you have borrowings reported to both. Otherwise monitor the bureau your main lender uses and check the other file free once a year.

How long does identity theft damage last on a Canadian credit file? A fraudulent tradeline stays until it is disputed and removed. That is why the dispute, not the monitoring subscription, is the step that ends the problem.

What should I do first after a privacy scam? Report it to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre, tell your bank and the affected provider, then order both credit reports and file a fraud alert with each bureau.

Can I cancel a monitoring subscription and get a refund? Usually not for a partial period. Check the notice period before the renewal date, because cancelling after it means paying for another term.