According to New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office, Equifax is fully cooperating with regulators as it is attempting to address the issues that led to it becoming one of the largest and worst data breaches in U.S. history.
Schneiderman’s office was among the first to pursue a formal investigation after it became public knowledge that Equifax had been the victim of a cyberattack that left 143 million Americans’ data fully exposed to identity theft from cybercriminals who hacked so hard for it.
And, going in, the AG’s office did not lack for issues with Equifax and its handling of any part of the breach timeline. Among identified problems were how Equifax notified the world of its breach, a forced arbitration clause inserted into Equifax’s free credit monitoring contracts and its failure to provide Spanish-language customer service.
“Following conversations with our office, Equifax has addressed all of those issues,” Clark Russell, deputy bureau chief of the state regulator’s Bureau of Internet and Technology, said in prepared remarks to a New York State Senate Consumer Protection hearing.
He also noted that Equifax had agreed to provide consumers the ability to lock and unlock their credit file for life at no charge to prevent identity theft.
And though that is better, regulators have been quick to note, it does not account for the issues that people have faced because of the breach. Maria Vullo, superintendent of New York’s Department of Financial Services (DFS), told the same hearing:
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“It simply is unacceptable for a company that profits from consumers’ private information to fail to have adequate protections.”
