They make this difficult, and charge for doing this.

Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has introduced a bill requiring the credit bureaus to offer a credit freeze for free:

In the wake of the the massive Equifax customer data breach, many consumers are wondering: Why, exactly, should we be paying the credit bureaus for credit freezes or monitoring when it was one of them that just lost all our personal data? Two U.S. Senators are wondering that, too, and have now introduced a bill to fix it.

Senators Elizabeth Warren (MA) and Brian Schatz (HI) today introduced a bill that would prevent credit bureaus from charging people for freezing their records. In the grand tradition of government backronyms, the bill [PDF] is called the FREE Act, or Freedom from Equifax Exploitation Act. (Yes, that would actually be the FFEE Act. Maybe you’re supposed to squint a little.)

The bill’s purpose is simple: If passed, it would stop credit bureaus from charging consumers to place a freeze on their credit records to prevent identity theft.

Good policy and good politics.

Needless to say, Democratic “moderates” will find a way to oppose this.