Equifax Just Changed the Rest of Your Life
“Credit freezes lock down your credit reports in a way that should prevent “new account fraud,” or bogus accounts being opened in your name. But there are so many other ways the bad guys can use the information they stole, which included Social Security numbers, birthdates, addresses and some driver’s license numbers. Others include:
- Stealing your tax refund and preventing you from filing returns by submitting fake ones
- Using your information to get health care, which can result not only in medical collections on your credit reports but a stranger’s health information getting mixed in with your records
- Giving your identification to the police when they get arrested, creating criminal records that could land you in jail or prevent you from getting a job
- Filing for bankruptcy in your name or transferring deeds of property you own.”
As consumers, we continue to pay the price for the inadequate investment that companies have made to ensure our identities and identifying data are safe and secure. At a minimum, we should be demanding that our banks, hospitals and shopping centers adopt new technology and systems that will do this.
TASCET’s standard identification process provides not only the ability for companies to uniquely identify their customers, clients and patients, but also to make their identity anonymous and data useless to potential hackers in the event of a breach.
