Five years ago, a massive data breach occurred. On Sept. 7, 2017, the Equifax credit bureau publicly revealed its computer networks had suffered a data leak that exposed the personal information of 143 million consumers, a number later raised to 147 million. That data included consumers’ names, addresses, dates of birth, Social Security numbers and credit card numbers — all of which could lead to identity fraud and other financial crimes.
The data breach, announced six weeks after it was discovered, rattled the financial services industry, the cybersecurity sector and, most notably, the millions of consumers who were affected. The Equifax data breach had a powerful impact: