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FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

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Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#41
post #33
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have a strong opinion either way on your corporate death penalty proposal, but I do strongly support jailing top-level executives for very long terms. We need to set examples. Everyone on this page[1] should be behind bars for I dunno, five years? Ten? If you don't want to risk that kind of sentence, then don't horde that kind of data. [1] https://www.equifax.com/about-equifax/corporate-leadership/

What kind of data? I’d understand people being this upset if Equifax actually had private data. Equifax just has a bunch of essentially public financial data, addresses and such. None of that is actually private.

> Equifax just has a bunch of essentially public financial data, addresses and such. None of that is actually private.

I agree that the information IS public. However, employers do not. Employers share employee compensation with Equifax but they refuse to share it with their employees. So which one is it? Is employee compensation public or is it not? If it is, please disclose compensation to all your employees to all employees. If it is not, then stop disclosing it to Equifax.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#42
post #35
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

150M people have not suffered $125 damages each

How much is your time worth?

That’s an utterly irrelevant question unless you have evidence of the equifax data being abused.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#43
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay out several months of severance to each innocent employee.

First nationalise the legal entity so that the board cannot block the actions. Maybe pay a fair share of paid-for capital to employees, proportional to their pays they earned for the last full payment period, as a severance (this might result in lower-than-minimum severance, but better than nothing that you would get in a regular bankruptcy). However, shareholders which would get more dividends than this payout shoul…

Why should shareholders get a dime? They backed a shitty company, they should also feel that pain. If they don't want to get hurt like that, they should utilize their rights to keep dangerous and toxic people out of executive level positions

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#44
"The FTC said Wednesday that consumers rushing to get a $125 check from Equifax as restitution for its 2017 cybersecurity breach should consider the credit monitoring option because the company could run out of money before satisfying all the claims."

As someone that constantly watches credit brokers abuse a broken system, I'm okay with this. Let their CEOs get their parachute pay. while their reputations are publicly and privately castrated.

Honestly, as consumers, we can go after that too, if we really want.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#45
post #34

I'm sure I'm not the only one actually wishing they run out of money. I'd be happy to put them on a payment plan.

It won’t work like that, though. It’ll just mean that the 125 the vast majority of people expected will probably end up at 25 bucks each, depending on how many people requested the cash payout.

If everyone eligible claims the $125, it's more like $0.25. Many won't, but everyone will be lucky to receive enough for a cup of coffee.

It's all a sham. And they are still compiling all of our information so make the next breach even better.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#46
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As part of the settlement you can charge for your hourly time that you had to spend figuring out credit monitoring

Comes out of the same $31 million. I'm unsure how distribution will work once more than $31 million is requested, but you're likely not going to see the full amount.

My reading of the settlement is that of the $310 million, up to $31 million (10%) is allocated to hourly time claims (section 6.2.6) and a separate $31 million is allocated to "Alternative Reimbursement Compensation", i.e. the $125 cheques (section 7.5).

So it's still capped at the same amount, but comes from a different pool.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First nationalise the legal entity so that the board cannot block the actions. Maybe pay a fair share of paid-for capital to employees, proportional to their pays they earned for the last full payment period, as a severance (this might result in lower-than-minimum severance, but better than nothing that you would get in a regular bankruptcy). However, shareholders which would get more dividends than this payout shoul…

Why should shareholders get a dime? They backed a shitty company, they should also feel that pain. If they don't want to get hurt like that, they should utilize their rights to keep dangerous and toxic people out of executive level positions

Shareholders may also have wage-related earnings due to managerial/executive roles. Not all people are stock investors. A week of minimum wage is way less than their initial investment in average.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#48
post #8
post #2

The FTC's FAQ that was updated: https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/cases-proceedings/refunds/eq... > 5. I thought I could choose $125 instead of free credit monitoring. What happened? > The public response to the settlement has been overwhelming. Millions of people have visited this site in just the first week. Because the total amount available for these alternative payments is $31 million, each person who takes the mo…

I wonder where the other $400 million is going if its only capped at $31 million.

Most of the rest of it isn't actually money that will be changing hands. They're going to be providing ~ $330 million worth of their services for free and there are a couple highly specialized pools of money that need documented proof to tap into.

Aka the settlement was actually for $31 million and bull shit.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#49
post #2

The FTC's FAQ that was updated: https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/cases-proceedings/refunds/eq... > 5. I thought I could choose $125 instead of free credit monitoring. What happened? > The public response to the settlement has been overwhelming. Millions of people have visited this site in just the first week. Because the total amount available for these alternative payments is $31 million, each person who takes the mo…

If 150M people have suffered $125 in damages each, then Equifax needs to either pay out the $18B or declare insolvency.

I agree. This is the best solution. This is what Equifax deserves.

Though honestly, it's not enough.

How much damage can someone do with my name and social security number? I bet you it's more than 125 dollars can fix.

This data could end up circulating the web or dark web for years and years.

Re: FTC: Equifax might run out of cash, so please take the credit monitoring

#50

It seems absurd that they only need to allocate $31 million for "alternative payments" while the old CEO leaves with close to $20 million in bonuses [0], while the rest of the money in the settlement is basically reserved for them to pay themselves for their "free" credit monitoring. This whole situation was a good opportunity to set a precedent for companies not taking data security seriously. But they've instead sh…

What I want to know is how they established part of the settlement for damages caused by the breach, yet there is 0 evidence that any of the data has ever become public. How would someone prove they were affected, if nobody was affected?
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