Freezing your SSN can save you from serious financial harm. fstop123/Getty Images

Your Social Security number is a crucial piece of financial information. It's used for everything from applying for jobs to buying a house. Protecting it is absolutely essential to keeping your information private, but that's not always easy in the digital age.

With millions of SSNs potentially exposed on a regular basis, it's never been a better time to protect yourself. You can sign up for an identity protection service to monitor things, but another simple and free option is locking down your Social Security number.

Freezing, or locking, your SSN makes it much more difficult for cybercriminals to access and take advantage of your personal information. By combining a lock on your SSN with a cred

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