Full Answer
How much did Equifax pay to settle the breach?
Under a settlement filed today, Equifax agreed to spend up to $425 million to help people affected by the data breach. If you were affected by the Equifax breach, you can't file a claim just yet.
What is the deadline to file a claim in the Equifax settlement?
The initial deadline to file a claim in the Equifax settlement was January 22, 2020. After January 22, 2020, you can still file a claim for expenses you incur between January 23, 2020, and January 22, 2024, as a result of identity theft or fraud related to the breach, such as:
Is there an extended claim period for the Equifax breach?
There's an extended claims period for that, which runs till 2024. The 2017 Equifax data breach exposed personal data, including in some cases Social Security and driver’s license numbers, of more than 147 million consumers.
How do I find out if I was affected by Equifax breach?
Earlier this week, we told you that roughly half the people in the country can get benefits under a settlement that the FTC and others reached with Equifax. Now, you can now find out if you were affected by the September 2017 breach and make your claim for benefits. Start at ftc.gov/Equifax.
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Has Equifax settlement been approved?
Court Approves Equifax Breach Settlement: Money for Some, Free Credit Monitoring for All. Equifax will pay up to $425 million in restitution to those directly impacted by the massive data breach of the credit bureau in 2017. A federal court gave final approval to the class-action lawsuit settlement in mid-January.
How much will each person get from Equifax settlement?
Under the settlement terms, Equifax agreed to set up a fund to provide free credit monitoring and identity theft protection to consumers, as well as provide cash payments to people affected by the breach—up to $20,000 per person.
How much can you get from a data breach settlement?
How much can I receive from the Capital One settlement? Class members can collect up to $25,000 in cash for lost time and out-of-pocket expenditures relating to the breach, including unreimbursed fraud charges, money spent preventing identity theft and fees to professional data security services.
Where is my Equifax settlement check?
EquifaxBreachSettlement.comStatus of financial reimbursement For more details and to check your claim status, visit EquifaxBreachSettlement.com . If you were affected by the Equifax data breach, you can still claim financial reimbursement for costs you incurred, or time you spent dealing with fraud or identity theft, after January 22, 2022.
Will Equifax pay $125?
If you asked for money If you requested compensation of up to $125 or reimbursement for time spent recovering from fraud or ID theft, a check or debit card will be mailed to the address you used when submitting your claim. Be prepared for compensation that is much less than you requested.
Who qualifies for Equifax settlement?
You are a Settlement Class Member if you are among the approximately 147 million U.S. consumers identified by Equifax whose personal information was impacted by the Equifax Data Breach.
What happens if impacted by breach of Equifax?
Information Assurance recommends that anyone who may have been affected by the Equifax data breach take the following five actions:Put a fraud alert on your credit report. ... Keep an eye on bank account and credit card statements. ... Check your free credit reports. ... Turn on two-factor for Weblogin and for personal accounts.More items...•
How do I know if Equifax breach affected me?
Equifax has created a website where you can find out if you have been affected by the breach. The website will ask you for the last six digits of your social security number and your last name, and then will tell you if you have been affected. You can also call 1-833-759-2982.
Does Equifax sell your information?
We use and sell personal data to nonaffiliated third parties for the following commercial purposes: Consumer credit reporting. Some of our affiliates collect, use, and sell personal data when acting as a consumer reporting agency, as this activity is regulated by the FCRA.
How much can you expect from a class action lawsuit?
A class action usually ends in a settlement as opposed to going to trial. Settlements in recent years have averaged $56.5 million.
How are class action settlements divided?
Class action lawsuit settlements are not divided evenly. Some plaintiffs will be awarded a larger percent while others receive smaller settlements. There are legitimate reasons for class members receiving smaller payouts.
When is the deadline to file a claim against Equifax?
The deadline to file a claim for Out-of-Pocket Losses or Time Spent that occurred through January 22, 2020 has passed.
When does the settlement become effective?
The Settlement will become effective after all appeals have been resolved in favor of the Settlement. If you requested a cash benefit during the Initial Claims Period, the amount you receive may be significantly reduced depending on how many valid claims are submitted by other class members.
What happens if you are impacted by Equifax?
If you were impacted by the Equifax data breach, you may seek reimbursement for valid Out of Pocket losses or Time Spent (excluding losses of money and time associated with freezing or unfreezing credit reports or purchasing credit monitoring or identity theft protection) incurred during the Extended Claims Period if you have not received reimbursement for the claimed loss through other means.
How much time can you spend on a data breach?
You may be eligible for the following reimbursement cash payments for: Time Spent during the Extended Claims Period recovering from fraud, identity theft, or other misuse of your personal information caused by the data breach up to 20 total hours at $25 per hour.
When is the deadline for Equifax?
If you are a class member, the deadline to file Initial Claims Period claim (s) for free credit monitoring or up to $125 cash payment and other cash reimbursement passed on January 22, 2020.
When is the deadline for credit monitoring in 2024?
January 22, 20 24 (For future losses and time) File a claim for Credit Monitoring Services or Alternative Reimbursement Compensation. The deadline to submit a claim to receive the Free Credit Monitoring Services offered under the Settlement, or Alternative Reimbursement Compensation has passed.
When is the extended claim period for credit monitoring?
You may seek reimbursement for valid Out-of-Pocket Losses or Time Spent (excluding losses of money and time associated with freezing or unfreezing credit reports or purchasing credit monitoring or identity theft protection) incurred during the Extended Claims Period (between January 23, 2020 and January 22, 2024) if you have not received reimbursement for the claimed loss through other means.
How much can you get for a breach of contract?
If you suffered losses as a result of the breach and can provide documentation of your out-of-pocket costs, you may be eligible for cash payments up to $20,000.
What happened to the Social Security numbers in 2017?
In 2017, the personal information of over 145 million Americans was exposed by one of the largest data breaches in recent times. The breach occurred at Equifax, one of the three credit reporting bureaus entrusted with some of the most sensitive personal data, including Social Security Numbers. If you are one of the individuals impacted by the breach (hint: you probably were), you can now file a claim as part of a settlement that Equifax is finalizing to resolve claims.
Can you file a claim if your personal information was compromised by the breach?
You are eligible to file a claim if your personal information was compromised by the data breach. There is a dedicated page - https://www.equifaxbreachsettlement.com/ - with important information about the proposed settlement.
When did the Equifax data breach settlement end?
The period for filing initial claims in the Equifax data breach settlement ended Jan. 22, 2020. If you filed a claim, all that's left now is waiting for benefits to arrive. However, new appeals to the approval of the settlement will delay the distribution of benefits. But everyone — even those who didn’t file a claim in ...
How many people were affected by the Equifax breach?
The 2017 Equifax data breach exposed personal data, including in some cases Social Security and driver’s license numbers, of more than 147 million consumers. Equifax agreed to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to help consumers affected by the breach.
What can I do to protect my credit?
The very best protection is freezing your credit. In response to the Equifax breach, freezing and thawing credit are now free in every state.
Is Equifax data breach settlement website updated?
The Equifax data breach settlement website will be updated with developments. You can enter your claim number on the website to check the status of your claim.
When is the extended claim period for identity theft?
There's an extended claims period for that, which runs till 2024.
Who reviews settlement claims?
Claims are being reviewed and validated by settlement administrator JND Legal Administration. (A settlement administrator is a neutral party that makes sure a court-approved settlement is followed exactly.)
Can I opt out of allowing credit bureaus to have my data?
The short answer is no. If you use credit products such as car loans, credit cards or a mortgage, data about your accounts is likely to be shared with the credit bureaus by your creditors. The only thing you can opt out of is receiving prescreened offers.
How to find out if you were breached by Equifax?
To find out if you're a victim of the Equifax data breach, the company has set up a website where U.S. consumers can query a database and file claims: EquifaxBreachSettlement.com.
How much did Equifax pay for data breach?
On the heels of one of the largest data breaches in American history, credit bureau Equifax recently agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit in the most costly penalty stemming from a data breach to date: around $780 million.
What is fairly traceable in a settlement?
One item in the settlement that consumer advocates have taken note of is the "fairly traceable" standard upon which reimbursement claims are tested. Requests for compensation related to the settlement must be fairly traceable to the Equifax breach, a capacious standard that could allow claims to be approved based on circumstantial evidence alone, according to Kenneth Canfield, who is on the team of lawyers representing plaintiffs in the class-action suit.
How much did Anthem settle for?
When health insurer Anthem settled litigation in 2017 for $115 million over a data breach affecting around 80 million people, it was at the time the largest ever settlement for a data breach.
Who cautioned consumers who think they're out of the woods that hackers may be lying in wait until suspicion?
But Mierzwinski cautioned to any consumers who think they're out of the woods that hackers may be lying in wait until suspicion dies down.
Is there a way to know if the claims period is extended?
Even with the deferential terms of the deal, "there's no way to know" if the extended claims period is long enough to accommodate future misuse of data, according to Canfield. This is true, in part, because of how hackers have refined their methods in recent years, laundering data in more sophisticated ways to prevent immediate detection.
Do consumers have to have documentation to file a claim?
Most consumers should have access to any documentation required to submit a claim. The administrator of the settlement is not looking for forensic evidence, Canfield said, but rather documents and other files that one would normally collect when alerted to identity theft or misuse of personal information.
How did the Equifax breach happen?
The Equifax breach investigation highlighted a number of security lapses that allowed attackers to enter supposedly secure systems and exfiltrate terabytes of data.
How did Equifax handle the breach?
Among their stumbles was setting up a separate dedicated domain, equifaxsecurity2017.com, to host the site with information and resources for those potentially affected . These sorts of lookalike domains are often used by phishing scams, so asking customers to trust this one was a monumental failure in infosec procedure. Worse, on multiple occasions official Equifax social media accounts erroneously directed people to securityequifax2017.com instead; fortunately, the person who had snapped up that URL used it for good, directing the 200,000 (!) visitors it received to the correct site.
What data was compromised and how many people were affected?
It potentially affected 143 million people — more than 40 percent of the population of the United States — whose names, addresses, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, and drivers' licenses numbers were exposed. A small subset of the records — on the order of about 200,000 — also included credit card numbers; this group probably consisted of people who had paid Equifax directly in order to order to see their own credit report.
Who was responsible for the Equifax data breach?
As soon as the Equifax breach was announced, infosec experts began keeping tabs on dark web sites, waiting for huge dumps of data that might be connected to it. They waited, and waited, but the data never appeared. This gave rise to what's become a widely accepted theory: that Equifax was breached by Chinese state-sponsored hackers whose purpose was espionage, not theft.
How does the Equifax settlement work?
The settlement mandates that Equifax compensate anyone affected by the breach with credit monitoring services; Equifax wants you to sign up for their own service, of course, and while they will also give you a $125 check to go buy those services from somewhere else, you have to show that you do have alternate coverage to get the money (though you could sign up for a free service).
What are the lessons learned from the Equifax breach?
If we wanted to make a case study of the Equifax breach, what lessons would we pull from it? These seem to be the big ones:
Why did Equifax pull data out of the network?
The attackers pulled data out of the network in encrypted form undetected for months because Equifax had crucially failed to renew an encryption certificate on one of their internal security tools.
Here's the backstory
The Equifax data breach reported in July 2017 is one of the worst of all time. Critical information was stolen from over 147 million Americans, including Social Security numbers, dates of birth and home addresses.
How to take advantage of the Equifax settlement
The FTC verified the email’s legitimacy and that the settlement became final in January 2022. It went on to say the settlement administrator recently began sending emails and letters to people who filed a valid claim requesting free credit monitoring services from the settlement.
