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Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

bloomberg.com

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Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#361

Post by bsder »

tajen wrote: post #99
billh wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This class action will likely be settled in the same way the Ticketmaster case was settled ... with a coupon book good for 2 free credit reports.

One scenario would be SSN being massively used by pirates, so companies would stop trusting SSN altogether. Let's hope a startup creates a "proof of identity" service with a photo ID with a chip, a code, and an online certificate for tax purpose.

Where are the blockchain proponents? Oh, right, this kind of thing isn't a pyramid scheme. It would be a lot of grunt work and wouldn't be worth a VC investment.

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#362

Post by deanstag »

whipoodle wrote: post #330
deanstag wrote: post #312

With all the Equifax headlines today, I was wondering if there would be a few poor souls in the the Equifax Tech Department who feels atleast a bit responsible for the whole mess. ( I do understand it is a collective responsibility of the management as well ) edit: Was the analysis of the hack published?

You mean on the board of directors, not in the tech department. Edit: people never seem to like it when I say this. The phrase "the buck stops here" has a meaning.

Haha. I meant in all layers of the organization. Could be the IT Security Department, Policy Department, Could be the homegrown development team, anything.

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#363

Post by wlesieutre »

bradleyjg wrote: post #248
Bluestrike2 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, class action suits aren't really about recovering damages for the class members. Or at least, not entirely. That's almost incidental. Rather, they're most often about leveraging a large class of injured parties--whose injuries are usually relatively minor on an individual basis--to force a change of behavior by adding up all of those small injuries. The cost of pursuing each claim individually would usual…

> They may be imperfect, but they're a hell of a lot better than the alternative and have had a profound positive impact on our society. No, it isn't better than the alternative. The alternative is to have regulators selected and overseen by elected officials regulate the behavior of companies. We instead of a system of regulation by self appointed ad hoc lawyer-regulators negotiating settlements they think will get…

Regulators selected and overseen by elected officials aren't a foolproof solution either. Sometimes you end up with Scott Pruitt [1] running the EPA, whose objectives are apparently a) denying that climate change exists, and b) dismantling any environmental protections that businesses find inconvenient.

The self-appointed lawyer regulators at least have an incentive to do their jobs: they get a bunch of money.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Pruitt

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#364

Post by deanstag »

Z1nfandel wrote: post #352
deanstag wrote: post #312

With all the Equifax headlines today, I was wondering if there would be a few poor souls in the the Equifax Tech Department who feels atleast a bit responsible for the whole mess. ( I do understand it is a collective responsibility of the management as well ) edit: Was the analysis of the hack published?

The most frustrating place to be in these scenarios is the IT (especially security) department. Go ask any security guy if they think their environment is secure. Very few of us will say yes. It frequently boils down to we ask for things, and there are budget/manpower/time limitations in getting them implemented. So a breach occurs, execs say to IT staff "Why was this possible." IT staff says "We requested back in to…

Yeah, hopefully this is one of those wake up calls where the management realizes to funnel more resources into IT and security in general.

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#365

Post by slouch »

TCM wrote: post #270
larrykwg wrote: post #245

So let me get this right, this company collects credit information and someone hacked into their web server and stole highly sensitive information about most of the adult american population. Then the executives sold their stock a day before they announced the hack to the public. Besides the troubling fact that you still use social security and credit card numbers as any form of reliable authentication, how aren't th…

The NY Attorney general is looking into the situation now. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/08/business/equifax.html?rre...

PA to lead the investigation https://twitter.com/PAAttorneyGen/status/906244506844110848

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#366

Post by dmerrick »

cletus wrote: post #340

Ok, so credit reporting agency collects sensitive personal and financial data on basically every adult American, loses it to a bunch of criminals and now I have to deal with the consequences? I looked into credit freezes yesterday. This is really a total scam. You have to _call_ each of the three agencies and pay a fee ($5 to $10) each time. If you need to unfreeze your report to make a legitimate credit application…

Just chiming in to say that I was able to freeze all three online yesterday. No calls needed!

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#367

Post by carapace »

floatrock wrote: post #173
Dowwie wrote: post #97

Consider the possibility that the hackers were agents of a sovereign power, such as one who has been hurt by economic sanctions and has a history of cyber warfare. This state could decide to respond to US economic aggression by using the compromised information of hundreds of millions of Americans to engage in fraudulent activity. This event is leading me to about how social security numbers can no longer serve the r…

That was the threat when the OPM got hacked a few years back -- anyone who ever had a background investigation done for a federal job now had their background info in some russian or chinese database dump. With that level of detail, you could start blackmailing some Lockheed or Raytheon employees until they leak some stealth fighter radar secrets to make the monthly false homeloan headaches go away. I don't think the…

Welcome to WWIII, now in progress. The Russians are kicking our teeth in: they managed to trick us into electing Donald Trump as President...

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#368

Post by rconti »

andrewla wrote: post #237
rconti wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sort of / not really. I guess treble damages are not called "punitive" but they're also not "actual". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treble_damages

The GP was talking about Small Claims specifically -- I don't see anything on the linked page that refutes that. In fact, it seems like this applies very narrowly and only where specified by statute.

It was the best I could find. My understanding is that here in CA, if your landlord does not refund your deposit (or properly itemize legitimate expenses against said deposit) you can sue in small claims court and recover 3x damages, up to the small claims court maximum of $7500.

That said, I've never tried it, so it's possible my understanding is wrong.

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#369

Post by timzentu »

larrykwg wrote: post #245

So let me get this right, this company collects credit information and someone hacked into their web server and stole highly sensitive information about most of the adult american population. Then the executives sold their stock a day before they announced the hack to the public. Besides the troubling fact that you still use social security and credit card numbers as any form of reliable authentication, how aren't th…

That isn't the only thing that needs to be done. We need to make a new SSN system that is based on Public Key Crypto. Make 2 keys, one fully private stored offline completely by the government, one for us that we then use to create multiple hashes based on what we are doing. 1 for taxes, 1 for loans, 1 for SSN info, 1 for voting (so we can sign for our online voting), 1 for proof of work, etc. then when someone steals our info we can axe a key for that form, and create a new one. the primary key that we hold can't be changed without our knowledge, but in the case that our info is breached, and we lose either of the keys we then go to a government office and verify fully (with a few keys that had already been used and then get a new one. In the case of a bank breach though, we could just kill the existing one and change it at a local branch or online if we trusted that.

Re: Equifax Faces Multibillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Hack

#370

Post by cr0sh »

snomad wrote: post #220
raisedbyninjas wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Even the ones who do have their identities stolen will likely be made whole by the credit card companies." Fraudulent charges on a credit card are the least of my concerns. This opens us up to a lifetime of identity theft and insecure accounts of every sort. I'm not even sure how they can approach remedying the problem. Coordinate with the SSA to get 150 million people new SSNs at the least.

This is really the concern. With this level of detail, someone can open any kind of new account - not just credit card - dig into everyone's lives (or political opponents on social media for doxxing). And the threat remains in perpetuity. There is mo way to even estimate the damage as some devious ways of it harming us may not even exist yet.

> There is mo way to even estimate the damage as some devious ways of it harming us may not even exist yet.

Scifi story idea:

Far future. Life extension possible. The government will provide it free (if you want it) - one time only though - when you are near the end of your first life. Upon extension, this technology also turns the clock back to renew you to 20 years old.

You're 78 years old, frail, ready to kick it, but decide to do the extension. You go into the clinic. Give them your information, etc.

Bzzt.

We're sorry, you've already been rejuvenated before. We can't help you, unless you want to pay $$$$$$ for us to go ahead with the procedure.

lolwhut

yep.

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