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Congressman Kildee: Congress Must Hold Equifax Executives Accountable

October 26, 2017

Kildee Stands up for American Consumers Affected by Data Breach, Demands Equifax Executives Testify About Potential Illegal Insider Trading

Congressman Dan Kildee (MI-05), the Vice Ranking Member of the House Financial Services Committee, participated in a hearing Wednesday examining the massive data breach that occurred at Equifax affecting 145 million Americans. The hearing considered ideas for ensuring the integrity of our country's consumer reporting system and safeguarding consumer data. During the hearing, Congressman Kildee shared a story from a local constituent whose private information was exposed during the Equifax breach.

"My office has received a number of complaints about the breach and Equifax's support services. One example is Jim from Linden – a small town outside of Flint," Congressman Kildee said during the hearing. "As a retired banker, he has spent his career working with credit reporting agencies and he understands how they operate. When my constituent, Jim, heard about the breach, he went to the Equifax website to see if his information was stolen, which it was. He decided to freeze his credit as a precautionary measure. In navigating through the website, he wound up not on the page to freeze his credit but on the page where Equifax offered, for purchase, its product to protect his identity online. Jim, realizing the error, called Equifax to correct the issue. It took him over an hour on the phone with two different individuals at two different call centers to resolve the issue. Finally, he was able to freeze his and his wife's credit – but Equifax charged him $20 to do so. He reached out to my office because he wanted to make a consumer complaint against Equifax," Congressman Kildee said.

"My office was able to intervene on Jim's behalf to get his money refunded and ensure his credit was frozen. At the end of the day, my constituent's biggest complaint was that Equifax made it so hard for him to deal with an issue that was not his fault. My concern is for the millions of Americans that are not as comfortable online, the ones that were incorrectly charged for a service that should have been free immediately and didn't know to reach out to their Congressperson," Congressman Kildee continued.

Last month, as part of his continued effort to protect American consumers, Congressman Kildee sent a letter to Chairman Jeb Hensarling demanding that Equifax executives be called before the committee to testify about potential insider trading before the breach was disclosed to the public.

"Insider trading is a crime against the American public and our financial markets – striking at the heart of their integrity and fairness. It is the responsibility of this Committee to call attention to these activities and to ensure that securities laws appropriately protect the American investor and consumer," the letter read.

According to committee testimony, Equifax badly mishandled virtually every aspect of this breach, including failing to update a known software vulnerability for several months. After publicly announcing the breach, Equifax also failed to provide consumers with the tools they needed to safeguard against identity theft and other harm for free.

Constituents who have a complaint or problem with a financial product or service can contact Congressman Kildee's office or file a complaint with the Consumer Protection Bureau, which has returned $11.9 billion to American consumers from a variety of enforcement actions it has undertaken.

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