Suppose Alice is a "victim of identity theft". BigBank gives $10k to Fraudster as a loan, thinking that Alice is the actual recipient. Experian, Transunion and Equifax report this loan as a debt which Alice owes to BigBank. Who is the real victim? The credit reporting agencies want to convince people that the consumer is the victim, and so Alice bears the burden and risk of clearing her name. But it is the credit rep…
Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
121–130 of 551 posts
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
And then I'll get six months of free credit monitoring from Equifax? Oh boy!!1! More seriously, this is a breach big enough that Equifax should honestly no longer exist as a company. So call it $100/incident, and I'm happy. Other agencies would still exist, and, although they're just as terrible, it might get them to kick their asses into high gear to fix their security.
The NYT story states that they are already offering this to affected consumers: https://www.equifaxsecurity2017.com/potential-impact/ .
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#123How do you know if this affects you?
Edit: Seems that if you have a date you're impacted. https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/6yq36a/equ...
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#124Can some form of biometrics prevent such incidents going forward?
One can even fake DNA if you have enough time, money and expertise...
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#125Suppose Alice is a "victim of identity theft". BigBank gives $10k to Fraudster as a loan, thinking that Alice is the actual recipient. Experian, Transunion and Equifax report this loan as a debt which Alice owes to BigBank. Who is the real victim? The credit reporting agencies want to convince people that the consumer is the victim, and so Alice bears the burden and risk of clearing her name. But it is the credit rep…
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#126Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#127Hm, I tried using their tool to see if I've been impacted: https://www.equifaxsecurity2017.com/potential-impact/ Which says it would tell me if I'm likely impacted, but instead it just gives a date where I can enroll in some free product, but no info on whether I'm likely compromised. Anyone have a workaround? This is important to anyone that wants to identify if they've been "pwned."
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#128I strongly encourage anyone in the US to put a full credit security freeze on all three credit agencies. When a credit freeze is in place, you still have access to all of your existing loan accounts and whatnot (e.g. credit cards), but lenders cannot access your credit to open new accounts unless you want them to. It's not difficult nor expensive to do, and the freeze lasts until you decide to revoke it. Whenever you…
Anyone know if there's a way to get your free credit report if you can't answer the questions for the free one? The computer says no, and the phone number just sends a letter that says no. I tried to to buy one from my bank, but as far as I can tell they only sell subscriptions...
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#129I strongly encourage anyone in the US to put a full credit security freeze on all three credit agencies. When a credit freeze is in place, you still have access to all of your existing loan accounts and whatnot (e.g. credit cards), but lenders cannot access your credit to open new accounts unless you want them to. It's not difficult nor expensive to do, and the freeze lasts until you decide to revoke it. Whenever you…
https://www.transunion.com/fraud-victim-resource/important- contacts
Re: Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Information
#130Hm, I tried using their tool to see if I've been impacted: https://www.equifaxsecurity2017.com/potential-impact/ Which says it would tell me if I'm likely impacted, but instead it just gives a date where I can enroll in some free product, but no info on whether I'm likely compromised. Anyone have a workaround? This is important to anyone that wants to identify if they've been "pwned."