Attorney General William Barr announced today that the Department of Justice (DoJ) has indicted four members of the Chinese military for involvement in the 2017 Equifax hack, which compromised the personal data of about 150 million Americans. […]

Following the Federal government’s settlement with Equifax regarding its 2017 data breach, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., pledged to renew his push towards passing data privacy legislation. In a statement on July 22, Wyden urged the passage of his Consumer Data Protection Act, which he initially introduced in November of 2018. […]

Credit reporting agency Equifax said today it has agreed to pay $671 million to settle government investigations and legal actions related to a 2017 data breach that exposed information on about 147 million U.S. consumers. […]

For the first time, Moody’s has downgraded a company’s credit rating because of a cyberattack. […]

Data privacy took center stage in yet another Congressional hearing today, as the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs met for a hearing on privacy rights and data collection in a digital economy. […]

Several senators said today that high-profile private-sector data breaches like those disclosed by Equifax in 2017 and Marriott in 2018 serve to boost the urgency with which Congress should act to approve legislation that would implement the country’s first national private-sector cybersecurity regulations and procedures. […]

North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein released a report on Thursday that highlights the impact of data breaches on the state in 2018, and paired the report with a bipartisan bill to strengthen breach notifications to include ransomware attacks. […]

A new report released Monday by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee outlines the details of the 2017 Equifax data breach, and sets recommendations for future breaches in the private sector. […]

A bill introduced by Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer, R-Mo., chairman of the House Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit, on Sept. 7 aims to create a national standard for financial institutions to notify consumers of data security breaches. […]

A new GAO report details how Equifax submitted to audits from agencies with which the company had contracts, but declined an offer of help from the Department of Homeland Security in the wake of the company’s 2017 data breach that exposed sensitive personal information of 143 million Americans. […]

Welcome to MeriTalk News Briefs, where we bring you all the day’s action that didn’t quite make the headlines. No need to shout about ‘em, but we do feel that they merit talk. […]

Two House panels investigating the Equifax Inc. data breach are zeroing in on “technical and process” failures that led to the loss of personally identifiable information, including Social Security numbers, belonging to more than 145 million Americans, according to recently released documents. […]

The Government Accountability Office on Oct. 16  denied a bid protest filed by Equifax with the IRS. The bid protest is a result of Equifax losing a taxpayer identification and verification services contract with the IRS to rival consumer credit reporting agency Experian. With the denial, the IRS can now begin work with Experian on a one-year contract worth up to $795,000. […]

Senators in hearings this week denounced Equifax’s handling of the data breach that is now estimated to have affected 145 million Americans. Equifax Chairman and former CEO Richard Smith testified before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on Oct. 4. […]

President Donald Trump declared October 2017 National Cybersecurity Awareness Month. The announcement follows the Equifax breach in September, which affected about 143 million U.S. consumers. Trump signed a Cybersecurity Executive Order in May in an effort to strengthen Federal cybersecurity and hold agency heads accountable for security issues. […]

Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I., reintroduced legislation this week that would require companies that experience a breach to notify affected individuals within 30 days of the breach’s discovery and that they coordinate with the Federal Trade Commission to do so. […]

Comodo Threat Intelligence Labs investigated the Equifax data breach and found Equifax executives’ passwords available for sale on the Dark Web. Comodo found that more than 388 instances of Equifax user and employee endpoint data available for sale. This information includes usernames, titles, passwords, and login URLs, and the dates on which they were stolen. […]

Sens. Ed Markey, D-Mass, Richard Blumenthal D-Conn., Sheldon Whitehouse D-R.I., and Al Franken D-Minn., introduced a bill on Sept. 14 to require accountability and transparency for credit report companies that are collecting and selling personal information about consumers. The legislation follows the Equifax breach, which affected 143 million Americans. […]

The Federal Trade Commission issued a warning on Sept. 14 to consumers to be on the alert for phishing scams related to the Equifax breach. The FTC said people might call asking to verify consumers’ account information due to the Equifax hack. “Stop. Don’t tell them anything,” the FTC said in a statement. […]

The government needs to get tougher on financial institutions that endanger consumer data, as occurred in the recent Equifax breach, according to testimony at a Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee hearing. […]

After the credit monitoring company Equifax announced that it had detected a data breach affecting potentially 143 million U.S. consumers, Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., is calling for a House Judiciary Committee hearing to investigate the breach. […]