Hackers stole your social security number – and 143 million others
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Equifax is the largest consumer credit reporting agency in the United States and collects sensitive information on nearly a billion people worldwide. It’s a publicly traded company with annual revenue of over $3 billion and it has been in business for over a century.
With its experience and responsibility, it would be a sensible assumption that Equifax takes every measure possible to protect the data they hold.
And yet, this isn’t the case. As The Verge reported on September 7:
“Equifax announced today that 143 million US-based users had their personal information compromised this year. Attackers reportedly exploited a vulnerability on Equifax’s website to steal names, Social Security numbers, birthdates, addresses, and, in some cases, driver’s license numbers. Credit card numbers for approximately 209,000 people and certain dispute documents with personal identifying information for approximately 182,000 people were also accessed. Although Equifax operates in other countries, it didn’t detect any stolen personal information abroad.
The company says it discovered the breach on July 29th this year, and has since plugged the security hole. The company also set up a dedicated website — www.equifaxsecurity2017.com — for possible victims to sign up for credit file monitoring and identity theft protection.
Data breaches are fairly common, although those impacting Social Security and driver’s license numbers are rarer and more serious. The fact that Social Security numbers are included in the breach makes it likely that victims will be targeted for identity theft. Equifax says it’s working with both an independent cybersecurity firm and law enforcement to investigate.”
Yes, data breaches are fairly common, but they shouldn’t be. Many breaches start through failures in e mail security or best practices which allow access to corporate systems.
This type of cyberattack can be prevented with the use of Evizone. Through our proprietary software, users have access to the most secure electronic communications and compliance archiving platform commercially available.
Visit us at evizone.com to see how we do it.
About Evizone Ltd.
Evizone Ltd. is a revolutionary secure communications, encryption and compliance software and service provider based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Evizone offers innovative enterprise solutions in secure messaging (next generation beyond encrypted e mail) and encryption, encryption at rest, regulatory compliance, compliance archiving, WORM compliance, 17a-4 compliance, document life cycle management and communications governance and risk management. Evizone’s services protect organizations through best in class security, encryption, recipient controls, document life cycle management, discovery management, compliance management, compliance archiving, tamper proof WORM and 17a-4 compliance archiving and complete audit records against the enormous damage caused by communications breaches. Evizone’s patented technologies offer a level of security impossible to obtain with conventional or encrypted email and fast, powerful, user friendly compliance archiving. Evizone’s services are immediately available on multiple platforms and provide the strongest commercially available communications security and compliance archiving. You can follow Evizone on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Contact:
Tom Kott, HATLEY Strategy Advisors, 514.316.7082, tkott@hatleystrategies.com
