To be very worried about identity theft

[User48321]

A pension company which holds all my personal data (including full name, date of birth and national insurance number) has informed me that it's been hacked and that my data has been stolen by criminals. How worried should I be?

In fact, the hacking happened quite a long time ago, but they have only recently found out about it.

Nobody can tell you that. All you can do is sign up to one of the big credit referencing agencies and check it regularly.

And change all your passwords online if you managed your pension digitally.

Do I need to do that for the rest of my life?

They probably had their entire customer database stolen - not just your stuff. These breaches happen all the time, it's just more recently the law changed so that they have to tell you as soon as they know it happened now.

The chances of something specifically happening to you out of the masses of data stolen are low, but it's always good to keep an eye on your credit report.