- Joined
- Feb 16, 2008
- Messages
- 10,443
- Reaction score
- 4,479
- Location
- Western NY and Geneva, CH
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Other
Experian, the massive data-broker with far-reaching influence over your ability to get a mortgage, credit-card, or job, sold extensive consumer records to an identity thieves' service called Superget.info. Superget specialized in supplying identity thieves with "fullz" -- full records of their victims, useful for impersonating them and for knowing where their assets are. Experian sold the data through a third part called "Court Ventures" -- which they later acquired -- and the sales continued for about a year. Experian bills itself as a service for people worried about identity theft. It's not clear whether Experian will face any penalty for the wrongdoing.
[...]
All told, findget.me and superget.info acquired or sold fullz information on more than a half million people, the government alleges.
Experian sold consumer data to identity thieves' service - Boing Boing
This story brings several of my old pet peeves to mind:
- If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear
- It's entirely reasonable for employers to check your credit history before offering you a job
- Of course a bad credit rating should cost you money and opportunities, you're a bigger risk
I have long detested that the big three credit reporting agencies have so much personal data at their fingertips and that it can so significantly impact so many lives in so many ways. With any luck this will result in a massive paradigm shift when it comes to personal data.
In the mean time, my heart goes out to the hundreds of thousands directly impacted by this massive miscarriage of privacy, and to the millions who will feel its effects in the immediate future.