> The OptOutPrescreen.com website is only accessible through ISP's (Internet Service Providers) located within the United States and its territories.
Rarely see that on non-media sites.
Can someone explain what it does?
If you register for it then you won't get unsolicited credit offers from companies you don't have an affiliation with. So American Express can only go pulling random people they aren't affiliated with a score of over 700 or whatever and send card offers only to people who haven't opted out.
However, it doesn't prevent companies from marketing credit offers to people they do have an affiliation with. So if you have an AMEX card then American Express can market other American Express cards to you even if you signed up for prescreen opt out, and your bank can market their cards to you, and your airline rewards program can market their cards to you, etc.
Consider that they can probably do so simply by using a proxy located in the US, or while visiting the US.
"Legitimate" users don't notice, casually-interested people get annoyed, and fraudsters work around it.
It doesn't solve anything and I wish people would stop doing this.
Basically, credit card companies (and insurance companies) buy consumer data from the credit bureaus to send unsolicited offers. That site is for you to register with the bureaus that you don't want your credit report sold in that way. That's how come companies can still send you unsolicited credit offers when they already have your information from elsewhere, such as from your bank account or frequent flyer account.
I don't know which, if any bureaus operate in Canada or how that are allowed or not allowed to sell your data. That particular site gives you specifics information about American law (FCRA), and how things work in America with credit bureaus information sharing - it's completely irrelevant for Canada.