Equifax, you had one job. Now folks are mad and are letting their lawyers handle it. More than 30 lawsuits have been filed against Equifax Inc after the credit reporting company said thieves may have stolen personal information for 143 million Americans in one of the largest hackings ever.
Equifax disclosed the breach on Thursday, while it learned of the hacking on July 29.
It has since set up procedures that it says are intended to help people protect their Social Security numbers and other identifying information.
Some lawsuits have even criticized Equifax’s year of credit monitoiingr offersuggesting that Equifax might use this to push pricier services.
There is a securities fraud lawsuit filed accusing Equifax of misleading shareholders about its ability to protect consumer data to inflate its share price before the truth became known.
In the wake of all this Equifax’s share price closed down $10.11, or 8.2 percent, at $113.12 on Monday. It has fallen 20.7 percent in the two trading days since the Sept. 7 disclosure of the breach, reducing Equifax’s market value by more than $3.5 billion.