Discover Magazine's blog features one consumer's story of clicking a random "free credit report" search result and ultimately ended up getting charged hundreds of dollars for the report and some other subscriptions. Luckily she (I'm guessing it's a she) was able to get some of the charges refunded, but not all of them. Not all scammed consumers are so lucky.
Not every credit report that claims to be free is actually free. There is only one way to get your federally-mandated, no credit-cardrequired, no-strings-attached free credit report. I just did a Google search for "free credit report" and got over 25 million results. Thankfully, the number one result was the real free credit report, but a few other results in the top 10 were free credit report scams. They give you a free credit report, if you sign up for a trial membership for some other service. These "free" credit report providers hope you'll forget to cancel your trial so your credit card can be charged for up to a year of their service.
Annualcreditreport.com is the only place where you can get a federally-authorized free credit report. You will never enter your credit card number or sign up for a free trial. For more details read How to Get a Free Credit Report. For tips on recognizing free credit report imposters, read How to Avoid a Free Credit Report Scam.
Just like the scam ads on this page for free credit reports
LaToya, Credit Karma is another good option for a free credit score.