Elizabeth Warren Is Coming for the Equifax CEO

Warren has been pushing the former head of Equifax for answers.

Ron Sachs/CNP/Zuma

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) will question the former head of Equifax Wednesday—and if her recent statements about the Equifax hack are any indication, she’ll probably mop the floor with him. 

Richard Smith, the former CEO of Equifax, is set to testify before the Senate Banking Committee. Smith resigned last week as a result of this summer’s massive cyber breach at the credit reporting agency that exposed the private information—including credit card and Social Security numbers—of more than 143 million Americans. In advance of the hearing, Warren’s office sent Smith a list of 37 questions that she wants answered either in the hearing tomorrow, or in writing by October 16.

“Despite the fact that Equifax has now known of this breach for over nine weeks, and has put out two public statements on the breach, the company has not provided a full and complete accounting of the extent of the breach,” Warren wrote, calling the hack and Equifax’s response to it a “betrayal of customer trust and corporate responsibility.”

This is just the latest move in Warren’s pursuit of answers from Equifax about the massive hack and the company’s sluggish response. Though Equifax learned of the breach on July 29, 2017, the company didn’t announce it publicly until September 7, 40 days later. A week later, Warren launched an investigation into the breach, sending letters to the three largest credit reporting agencies with detailed questions about their plans to shore up protections in order to avoid future problems. In her initial letter to Equifax, Warren criticized the agency’s lack of transparency about the hack, its slow response, and its insufficient—even predatory—efforts to protect affected customers in the aftermath. Warren’s letter noted that the credit reporting agency’s initial effort to enroll customers in free credit monitoring required enrollees to sign away their right to sue Equifax. 

At the same time, Sen. Warren also proposed legislation, The Freedom from Equifax Exploitation (FREE) Act, which would require credit reporting agencies to offer customers free options to impose or lift a “credit freeze” that halts the sharing and selling of personal credit information to third parties. Credit freezes—which have been widely recommended in the wake of the Equifax breach as a way to prevent identity theft—typically cost between $3 and $10, and fees are also charged anytime a customer wants to lift or reinstate a freeze. Thanks to these fees, Equifax could effectively end up making money off the security breach by charging customers to freeze or unfreeze their credit.

Four days later, Warren excoriated Equifax in a Senate floor speech. “[It’s b]ad enough that Equifax was so sloppy that they let hackers into their system, but the company’s response has been even worse,” she said

Three days later, Warren expanded her investigation into Equifax, sending letters to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Equifax’s board of directors, and the Department of Homeland Security requesting additional information. Last week, Warren wrote a harsh op-ed criticizing Equifax for Fortune

When it comes to Wall Street financiers, Warren has developed a reputation for no-holds-barred questioning: Last year she eviscerated the CEO of Wells Fargo after news broke of employees creating millions of unauthorized bank accounts for customers. During confirmation hearings this winter for Trump’s slew of ex-Wall Street cabinet nominees—Steve Mnuchin, Wilbur Ross, and more—Warren gave several speeches opposing their nominations.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate