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Interesting question, isn’t it?
Who has our credit file…
The problem with answering that question is that there is no simple answer that we want to hear, because the truth is a tough pill to swallow.
To do this, I would like us to look at our recent history, so that we can follow the chain of events that led us to where we are today. I’ll first introduce you to a few scenarios to get you thinking like we do in our business of data/information security.
Let’s start with your credit score; We all know that we must have a good credit score to do essential things in life, like buying a car or a house, taking loans and opening credit card accounts. Now most of us also know that there are “credit bureaus” that are responsible for those numbers being in existence. However, how many times have you considered the fact that they must track your information and all of your purchases in order to create and maintain those records?
The truth is: it’s done constantly. Not only by credit bureaus, but by myriad other organizations whose sole purpose is to monitor and record our transactions; They are information brokers. Our Personally Identifiable Information (PII) is something that is widely monitored by many groups for one purpose or another, and that information is also bought and sold by information aggregators.
Very interesting, isn’t it? I thought so too!
Of course, this brokering of information is very benign in nature, as many businesses rely heavily on the exchange of this personal information, including law enforcement and the federal government. Did you know that there are also organizations affiliated with many of the credit bureaus that provide us with our credit scores, which are in business as information brokers and information aggregators?
I found this very interesting too, and I’ll explain why.
Many of these credit bureaus also have subsidiaries or child companies that provide services related to “identity theft”, which is nothing more than paying their customers to monitor their credit, which is something that His organization is already doing it. So, now, let’s add insult to injury in the fact that federal laws have been put in place that more or less require corporations that are unfortunate victims of data breaches, and it seems that number to offer to their customers (innocent victims) climbs daily for “Identity Theft” Services. Remember those services I just mentioned that child companies offer? Well, guess what, the next time you read a news report about a new business suffering a data breach, take a look at who owns the company providing the services.
Let’s take a look at what’s covered: Credit bureaus monitor our information; information brokers collect our information for the credit bureaus; Information aggregators buy and sell our information that was collected by information brokers; Subsidiaries of credit bureaus are providing credit monitoring services for us when we are victims of identity theft due to data breaches.
Now imagine for a moment what would happen if an identity thief impersonated one of these information aggregators… Scary, isn’t it? Well, unfortunately, it’s already happened at least once – you’ll remember when a well-known credit bureau alerted the public that they’d been the victim of a breach. i’m afraid it will happen again
Businesses, I’ve found, tend to fall victim to the scenarios I mentioned when it comes to their employees, both concerned with productivity with the corporate bottom line, as well as with employees suffering more medical issues. contrastive stress.
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