Credit Karma is a Web site known mostly for the fact that it offers free credit scores, and was one of the first sites to do so. In the past, when free credit scores seemed only to be a come-on to trick you into some sort of credit monitoring subscription service, many people wondered if Credit Karma was legitimate or just another scam pulling a bait-and-switch. However, then as now, Credit Karma does offer free credit scores with no real strings attached, other than the fact that they most definitely want to use those scores as an entry point to other things.
In our eyes, Credit Karma asks for too much personal information before it will give you your free credit score. We’d suggest you look at other ways to get your free credit score (including FICO scores) before giving up so much info to Credit Karma. These days there are a ton of free options out there.
See, Credit Karma makes its money by providing leads to other financial companies, with credit cards being the big fish. If you’ve just looked up your credit score at Credit Karma, you might be in the market for a credit card, yes? So, if you ever wondered how Credit Karma could give free credit scores, you can be sure they are making more than enough money on the back end to make those scores a simple marketing cost. And the best way to sell you on other financial products is to get as much of your personal information as possible, more than they really need. But we’ll get back to that.