http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2015/09/why_you_should_freeze_your_credit_report_before_a_data_breach.html

You hand over your credit card to an unscrupulous cashier at the frozen yogurt place, or purchase crazily underpriced Ray-Bans from a sketchy website, or realize your card fell out of your pocket on the bus—and a couple of days later, your financial institution calls you about a suspicious transaction. Identity theft in the form of stolen credit card or bank account information has become a nuisance most Americans will deal with at some point. Although financial companies in the United States are slowly improving some aspects of security (chip-enabled cards have finally arrived after years of use in other countries), there seems to be little you can do to prevent your personal information from ending up in the hands of people you’d rather not have it.