Your debit card and credit cards might be fine for everyday transactions. But what if you want a little extra privacy protection for a single purchase or don’t want to bother with credit checks for the simple convenience of a credit card? Prepaid credit cards can offer some of that same convenience but with greater privacy.

Let’s look at three ways prepaid credit cards (or prepaid debit cards) can help you better protect your privacy as a consumer.

1. Prepaid credit cards offer some level of anonymity.

Debit cards are tied to your personal bank accounts. That means they’re also tied to your name, address, and other personal information. Credit cards involve giving your personal details to an issuing bank for an application.

Prepaid credit cards give you some semblance of anonymity if you need it. You can buy one from a local retailer with cash, without having to give away any of your private information. Even if you have to register the card to use it for online purchases, you can still give up less personal info than you would to a traditional credit card company or bank.

2. Your regular credit card and debit card numbers are protected.

You might only need extra privacy for a specific purchase or two. Prepaid cards can also fill this need. You can give a retailer or service provider the card details for a throwaway account rather than giving them your real credit card or debit card number.

If you don’t trust a company completely but still want to make a purchase, or if you’re in an unfamiliar place, this can be a safer option. Even if the card is lost or stolen, it’s not tied to a higher bank account balance or credit limit. At most you would lose the amount you pre-funded to the card.

3. You don’t give anyone access to your credit file.

To get a traditional credit card, you’ll have to give the issuing bank access to your credit file. That’s how they can review your credit history to decide if you’re creditworthy enough to be approved for a credit card.

Maybe you don’t want to give anyone access to this information. Perhaps you’re repairing your credit and prefer not to apply for one until you’re happier with your results (but you need a card for convenience’s sake right now). Or maybe you just have too many recent enquiries on your account and you’d like to minimise new ones. In these cases, you can get the convenience of a card without the credit check by turning to prepaid credit cards.

While prepaid credit cards can offer greater privacy protection than traditional credit cards or debit cards, it’s important that you don’t lose sight of the risks. Keep the higher prepaid card fees in mind for example so you can decide what matters most to you at this time — a sense of anonymity or keeping costs down.