How to Cancel Aura in 2026 (Identity Theft Protection You Don't Need)
Updated 2026-02-21 · 7 min read
⚠️ The identity protection industry secret: Credit monitoring — Aura's core feature — is available for free from each of the three credit bureaus. The "dark web monitoring" that Aura charges $12-30/month for is trivially available through free services like Have I Been Pwned. Most of what you're paying for is fear-based marketing.
Aura will show retention offers and "what you'll lose" warnings — click through to confirm
You'll keep access until the end of the billing period
💡 Alternative cancellation: If you can't find the cancel button online, call Aura at 1-855-712-0021 and say "I want to cancel my subscription." They'll try to retain you but must process the cancellation if you insist.
Aura Refund Policy
Free trial: Cancel within 14 days for no charge
Annual plan: 60-day money-back guarantee (rare in the industry — use it)
Monthly plan: No refund for current month
After 60 days: No prorated refund, but access continues until end of term
What Aura Provides vs. What's Free
Let's break down every Aura feature and its free equivalent:
Credit monitoring — Aura monitors all 3 bureaus ✅ Free alternative: AnnualCreditReport.com (free weekly reports), Credit Karma (free Equifax + TransUnion), most credit cards include free FICO monitoring
Dark web monitoring — Aura scans for your info on dark web ✅ Free alternative:Have I Been Pwned (free email breach alerts), Google Password Checkup (built into Chrome), Firefox Monitor
VPN — Aura includes a VPN ✅ Free alternative: ProtonVPN free tier (unlimited data, no logs, Swiss privacy)
Antivirus — Aura includes antivirus ✅ Free alternative: Windows Defender (99.5% detection rate) + macOS XProtect
$1M identity theft insurance — Aura's headline feature ⚠️ Reality: This covers recovery expenses (legal fees, lost wages), not stolen money. Your bank already reverses fraudulent charges. Most people never need to claim this insurance.
Credit lock — Aura lets you lock/unlock credit ✅ Free alternative: Freeze your credit directly at Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion — free by federal law since 2018
The Real Way to Protect Your Identity (Free)
These 5 steps provide better protection than any paid identity monitoring service:
Freeze your credit at all 3 bureaus (free, takes 10 minutes total). This prevents anyone from opening accounts in your name — the single most effective identity theft prevention
Use a password manager (Bitwarden, free) with unique passwords for every account
Enable 2FA everywhere — use an authenticator app (not SMS) for banking, email, and social media
Check your credit weekly at AnnualCreditReport.com (free since 2023 — used to be annual only)
💰 Savings: Aura Family ($360/year) replaced by credit freeze (free) + Bitwarden (free) + ProtonVPN Free + Have I Been Pwned (free) + AnnualCreditReport.com (free) = $0/year. The free option is objectively more secure because a credit freeze prevents identity theft, while Aura only notifies you after it happens.
The Identity Protection Industry Is Fear-Based Marketing
Aura, LifeLock, Identity Guard, and similar services profit from your fear of identity theft. Their ads show worst-case scenarios and imply you're unprotected without them. But here's the truth: credit monitoring only tells you after someone has already used your identity. A credit freeze prevents it from happening. Monitoring is like a smoke alarm — useful, but a sprinkler system (credit freeze) is better. And the smoke alarm is free anyway.
If you've been a victim of a data breach (most Americans have), your breached company often provides 1-2 years of free identity monitoring anyway. Check your email for breach notification letters before paying Aura $144-360/year for the same service.
Is Aura quietly charging you?
Upload your bank statement — we'll find Aura, LifeLock, and every other identity/security subscription draining your account.