WASHINGTON—The Senate Banking Committee will hold a hearing on Oct. 17 on consumer data security at the credit bureaus in further follow-up to the Equifax data breach, which affected potentially more than 145 million Americans.
The hearing will begin at 10 a.m. ET Tuesday.
During the Oct. 17 hearing, Andrew Smith, a partner at Covington & Burling LLP, will testify on behalf of the Consumer Data Industry Association, which has the mission of educating the public, legislators and regulators about responsible use of consumer data. Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, is also set to testify on the importance of upholding consumers' right to privacy, reported NAFCU.
In addition to obtaining personal information – including Social Security numbers – of 145.5 million Americans, Equifax recently announced hackers gained access to driver's license information of almost 11 million U.S. consumers. Reports indicate this will likely lead to more fraudulent activity, as driver's license information is often used to verify a person's identity when disputing credit-report information, NAFCU explained.
NAFCU noted that it has been a leading advocate for a national data security standard that holds all entities that handle personal financial data to the same standards as credit unions and other depository institutions under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA). It has called for action to ensure that credit unions do not bear the cost of negligent data practices by entities like Equifax.
The association also advocates that credit rating agencies already subject to parts of the GLBA, like Equifax, be held to the same regulatory requirements as depository institutions.