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Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

krebsonsecurity.com

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Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#21

Post by dragonwriter »

convolvatron wrote: post #18
gascan wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Am I missing something here? Paying cash doesn't prevent the opening of fraudulent lines of credit in your name. Equifax et al don't particularly care if you pay cash, they have some form of record on you either way.

if you use cash exclusively, then you have no credit to exploit. equifax knows about me, but no one will give me a loan.

> if you use cash exclusively, then you have no credit to exploit

If you have income and have and pay any recurring bills (even utilities, etc.) you have credit to exploit; it may be a fairly weak credit history, but if you have no substantive debt, you probably also then have a good listed debt-to-income and debt-to-asset ratio, which can (potentially more than) offset that sparse history when opening a new line of credit.

To be not exploitable you either need to be completely invisible to the system or appear so uncreditworthy that no one relying on the system would loan you money at all.

(Of course, personal data leaks from credit tracking DBs can be used for identity fraud for things unrelated to securing credit, too, and being visible but not creditworthy doesn't protect you from that at all.)

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#22

Post by pishpash »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #15

It's all so tiring. It's seriously going to be decades until we get politicians in power that understand the Internet and start holding companies accountable that don't give a shit about security (namely, all of them).

You are misreading it as an understanding issue. There are plenty of things politicians don't understand and there are experts for that, or else the country doesn't run. The impetus is never understanding, but power. Until there is political impetus for them to care, they don't.

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#23

Post by jschwartzi »

dragonwriter wrote: post #21
convolvatron wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you use cash exclusively, then you have no credit to exploit. equifax knows about me, but no one will give me a loan.

> if you use cash exclusively, then you have no credit to exploit If you have income and have and pay any recurring bills (even utilities, etc.) you have credit to exploit; it may be a fairly weak credit history, but if you have no substantive debt, you probably also then have a good listed debt-to-income and debt-to-asset ratio, which can (potentially more than) offset that sparse history when opening a new line of…

Can you file for bankruptcy without having any debt to discharge?

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#24

Post by pishpash »

twoodfin wrote: post #16
njarboe wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is already the law. You are not responsible to pay debts incurred by another person. The problem is when the bank or company that gave credit to someone else that used your identity information is allowed to lie to a credit bureau about the fact that it was you who defaulted on the debt. Otherwise you could just tell the bank, "Pound sand stranger, I never borrowed any money from you. Stop bugging me or I'll get…

I wish this framing would gain more currency, since it seems to me to accurately capture the problem: Creditors are (presumably unknowingly, but also largely uncaringly) lying when they report defaults against the wrong debtors. When Equifax repeats those lies to other potential creditors, they're also failing, but at root the misinformation originates with the creditor who failed to properly authenticate their custo…

There are laws against such "lying" but the burden of proof is on the victim as a practical matter [+], so of course creditors don't care when they make mistakes.

[+] Technically the burden of proof is on the creditor but victim has to continue to reach out to insist on such proof. If they do not expend extraordinary efforts to do so the record is against them.

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#25

Post by jrcii »

rcthompson wrote: post #19
Dirlewanger wrote: post #15

It's all so tiring. It's seriously going to be decades until we get politicians in power that understand the Internet and start holding companies accountable that don't give a shit about security (namely, all of them).

Will it ever happen? When the current generation of children reaches office-holding age, a majority of them may understand internet culture , but I don't think a significant fraction will ever understand the internet in a technical sense.

Intuitive UIs and walled-garden closed-source ecosystems have, counterintuitively, made the public generally /less/ technically literate although popularity of computers in the form of smartphones has increased. Look at the Google Trends results for any PC component.

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#26

Post by njarboe »

jessaustin wrote: post #14
njarboe wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is already the law. You are not responsible to pay debts incurred by another person. The problem is when the bank or company that gave credit to someone else that used your identity information is allowed to lie to a credit bureau about the fact that it was you who defaulted on the debt. Otherwise you could just tell the bank, "Pound sand stranger, I never borrowed any money from you. Stop bugging me or I'll get…

These proposed "large fines" would still require regular people to deal with putative creditors and occasionally to defend themselves in court. Structural changes are required to make the system as it actually functions more equitable to humans. What are structural changes? For instance, prior to enforcing a debt the law could require the production of an authenticated video recording of the debtor clearly stating, "…

I agree. First, it could be made a criminal offense for a company or bank to lie to credit agencies and then public prosecutors could pursue these companies for big PR wins.

Second, making giving and getting credit harder to do is probably a good thing for society. Do people really need to take out a half million dollar home loan from their phone a la Rocket Mortgage? Many cultures had/have very strict rules about charging interest on loans. Debt jubilees were common in past civilizations and seem necessary to prevent the masses from creating their own via revolution. Making personal loans illegal and bringing back the loan shark is not the way to go, but making going into debt to buy consumptive goods much harder would be big positive for most people in the US.

Like you said, there is a huge amount of money and power behind easy lending, so change seems unlikely. On the other hand, change seems to be in the air these days, so maybe one can afford a bit of hope.

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#27

Post by Deinos »

gascan wrote: post #11
reaperducer wrote: post #5

Bottom line: Whenever possible, wherever possible, pay cash. I used to laugh at my father-in-law whom I once considered to be a conspiracy theory whackjob with his off-the-grid lifestyle. As more and more of his "crazy" insights turn into New York Times headlines, I'm starting to think he was ahead of the curve.

Am I missing something here? Paying cash doesn't prevent the opening of fraudulent lines of credit in your name. Equifax et al don't particularly care if you pay cash, they have some form of record on you either way.

Exactly. As long as you have a SSN and other identification out there, you are a potential target...

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#28

Post by pishpash »

jessaustin wrote: post #8
toomuchtodo wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Call your local representative and demand this then. That is how legislation is enacted.

Yeah if you want to name a dog park after your brother-in-law who died in Iraq, that's how legislation is enacted. A giant change in how commerce is conducted, directly counter to the interests of major political donors? You can't be serious... In case it wasn't clear, I certainly support Shivetya's excellent suggestion to improve society for humans who live in it. I'm just not as optimistic about personal lobbying a…

Collective action and watchdogs are certainly more effective but even with personal lobbying, people tend to misunderstand the point of it: it isn't to affect change for that one person, whether immediately or ever, but to accumulate the political capital requisite to compete adequately with other political powers in an adversarial interests system. Not doing something is basically forfeiting the game.

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#29

Post by PotionSeller »

I absolutely hate our entire credit system, the lazy way it handles our sensitive info, and the eagerness to extend credit to anyone without scrutiny of their identity.

Big incoherent rant incoming:

In 2016 someone stole my identity and in about a 1 month period took out tens of credit cards and new bank accounts and phone account which they immediately over drafted. They somehow managed to change the address in my credit file, and so I wasn't getting any failure to pay notices. At the same time it was quite soon I found out because at least one creditor managed to find my real address asking about a 18,000 loan approval for furniture from The Brick. The police were easy enough to deal with and took a report and I had to use this to prove to creditors it was fraud.

I had Equifax do their own investigation, and they agreed it was fraud, but they only removed the creditors who happened to appear on file during their investigation.

A year past, and I check my credit and it was 799, all clear. Then last fall I get a call from a creditor saying I owe them money, they required I go to their bank to fill out the paperwork. One more cleared. Then in February I'm hearing from yet another bank about an overdraft account. Once again I proved to them it was fraud by providing the police report number. "Ok, well it will take us 30-45 days to remove this from your credit file". Its coming up to 45 days and its still there. I called them to clarify about when it will be removed, and get the same bs. I do not believe their word so I have also sent another dispute to equifax. MY MORTGAGE RENEWAL IS DUE JUNE 1 AND THIS SHIT HAS STOPPED ME FROM MOVING MORTGAGE PROVIDERS TO GET A BETTER RATE.

Now during this latest fiasco, I do another credit check and discover ANOTHER phone company on there says I have a bad debt with them and a note that a collections agency is after me. I succeed in having this removed from my credit file after dealing with Equifax, but for reasons beyond me they did not remove the one from the bank I am disputing in the previous paragraph, so I have to hope it will clear when they way it will (30-45 days from early April), or hope my second dispute works. Note that these latest bad debts are still originating from 2016, its just taken the banks that long to pin the blame on me and attack my credit file.

So this has been a lot of stress on me, I have failed to secure a new mortgage lender which will cost me in interest over the next 3 years on mortgage payments. In addition, I just discovered my TransUnion file is still a giant mess with shit from last fall on it. Apparently Trans Union and Equifax don't synchronize.

Long story short, there isn't shit you can do to speed up anyone helping you. The police are competent and will have your back but they can't stop creditors from attacking your file. Equifax is slow and not thorough in their investigations and make themselves hard to reach. The banks can pin a bad debt on anyone they chose, never mind that the onus should be on them to prove I took out the loans they claim. Like, show me a signature, show me the ID used to get the loan... Oh its fake? Then fuck off. Nope, they will make you jump hoops to prove it isn't you, and then the cherry on top is they will be very very slow to do anything to remove it off your credit file once you have in fact proven its not you.

Good luck to all of you, you are all vulnerable to this shit.

Re: Think You’ve Got Your Credit Freezes Covered? Think Again

#30

Post by patja »

rcthompson wrote: post #19
Dirlewanger wrote: post #15

It's all so tiring. It's seriously going to be decades until we get politicians in power that understand the Internet and start holding companies accountable that don't give a shit about security (namely, all of them).

Will it ever happen? When the current generation of children reaches office-holding age, a majority of them may understand internet culture , but I don't think a significant fraction will ever understand the internet in a technical sense.

This reminds me of the scifi first contact novel "Blindsight", which while not the best writing is chock full of intriguing concepts, one of which is the role of the "synthesist": a career where your job is to act just as a communications bridge between those who are so highly technically specialized (including cybernetic body modifications) that they are effectively incapable of communicating to managers and government officials. Hence the role of the synthesist, just to be a neutral observer who can help decision makers make sense of reality.
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