The credit monitoring company says the hack occurred sometime this summer and includes sensitive information like social security numbers, birth dates and credit card numbers.
Transcript for Equifax data breach could affect more than 140M Americans
Back now with that massive security breach possibly putting 143 million Americans at risk. Hackers targeting credit monitoring company equifax and now the FBI is investigating and Rebecca Jarvis is here with all the details. Good morning, Rebecca. Good morning to you, Michael. This is one of the largest data breaches in history. It happened at equifax, the company that tracks all your credit cards and mortgages to determine your credit score. Half of all Americans potentially exposed. Their highly sensitive personal information now in the hands of hackers. This morning, 143 million consumers potentially hit in a massive data breach of credit monitoring company equifax. The hackers accessing highly sensitive information including social security numbers, birth dates, addresses, even some driver’s license numbers as well as credit card numbers for approximately 209,000 Americans. The social security number is the skeleton key to our identities and when that’s stolen we’re in a position where we’re going to be have to be looking over our shoulders for the rest of our lives. Reporter: Equifax is one of three companies that tracks everything from your payments on credit cards, mortgage, student and car loins to determine your credit store. What equifax knows and reports about you decides whether you get a loan and how much you pay but unlike previous data breaches, many may not even be aware they are customers of equifax since equifax gets its information from bank, credit card companies and lenders, not consumers themselves. The unauthorized access happening between mid-may and July of this year. Equifax says it will mail consumers who have been affected, they’re also set up a website, exercisesecurity2017.com to help determine if you’ve been impacted and sign up there for credit monitoring and identity theft protection, but, Michael, you know once this number gets out, it’s out. And in the hands of a bad actor it’s a real big problem. You’re always looking over your shoulder and the most important thing is act now, make sure as a consumer you know what’s happening with your information. So much damage can be done with all this information. So much. Thank you, Rebecca.
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