The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has officially announced its data breach investigation to proceed on Equifax Inc (NASDAQ:$EFX). A top Democrat insinuated that the credit-monitoring company’s corporate leaders might need to resign.
Senate Democratic Leader Schumer stated: “It’s one of the most egregious examples of corporate malfeasance since Enron.” He also coined Equifax’s treatment of consumers “disgusting”, and its inability to protect data “deeply troubling.”
Shares of the company have accordingly lost nearly a third of its value in the week since the breach was announced. This lead to a two-year low on Thursday after the company confirmed a fixable web server vulnerability was in exploited. Specifically, the company confirmed that hackers used a flaw in its open-source Struts software, distributed by the nonprofit Apache Software Foundation, to break in.
Schumer elaborated that Equifax’s chief executive officer and board might need to resign if the company does not take concrete steps to revoke the damages done by the breach. Further, they would be required to testify before lawmakers and federal regulators.
Equifax CEO Richard Smith has agreed to testify on Oct 3, before the U.S. House of Representatives.
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