How to Freeze Your Credit and Stay Safe Online

You know better than to answer that spam email from some Nigerian prince asking you to wire money -- but anytime you send personal information through online forms or portals, you put your credit at risk.

It's not just obvious and cheesy scams that lead to trouble. Shopping, booking travel, banking and other activities you do online or through email create opportunities for your personal or financial information to be misused or stolen.

While many websites and companies take steps to protect visitors and customers, you can't rely on everyone else to keep you safe.

As we've seen multiple times over the past few years, major corporations are susceptible to data breaches -- and even credit bureaus themselves don't do all they can to properly safeguard consumer data, as 2017's scandal with Equifax revealed.

So how can you stay safe