Making an Equifax data breach claim

Resulting from a seismic cyberattack, the Equifax data breach was one the largest seen in recent memory. Hitting around 145 million US customers, the breach also affected approximately 700,000 UK customers. In response, we decided to launch a group action to hold Equifax to account and to claim compensation for the UK victims. Anyone who was notified of their involvement in the breach by Equifax may be able to make an Equifax data breach claim.

As an international credit reference agency, Equifax holds a wealth of personal information, much of which is highly sensitive. As a result of the data breach, millions upon millions of consumers were exposed to threats of information misuse and fraud, all of which was provoked by Equifax’s failure to patch a known cybersecurity vulnerability.

The importance of holding Equifax to account must not be underestimated. We hope that our group action will bring fair compensation to the victims, and will also send a message to Equifax and other data controllers that such negligence will not be tolerated.

The Equifax data breach – what happened?

In late 2017, it was revealed that Equifax’s systems had been breached by cybercriminals between May and July of the same year. Taking advantage of a cybersecurity vulnerability, hackers were able to access a wealth of personal information. For the 700,000 UK victims, this included:

• names;
• dates of birth;
• phone numbers;
• email addresses;
• driving license numbers;
• usernames;
• passwords;
• secret questions and answers;
• partially redacted credit card numbers.

Although not all the victims had the full range of these types of information exposed, the breach nevertheless allowed criminals to access a broad set of private details, amounting to approximately 15.2 million UK data records.

The fallout of the breach

The victims of the Equifax data breach were exposed to an immediate risk of data misuse. With the stolen data, cybercriminals were given the ability to commit identity theft and fraud, and to perform scams such as phishing emails.

Equifax has already been forced to pay penalties and compensation as a result of the data breach. In 2019, Equifax agreed to pay $700m in a US settlement, a large portion of which was to cover the expenses and losses of the victims. In the UK, the ICO, the data protection regulator, issued Equifax with a £500,000 fine for failing to protect the personal information of UK consumers. This amount is the maximum that could have been levied in accordance with the Data Protection Act before the GDPR enhanced the power of the ICO to fine organisations in the millions.

The previous legal action bodes well for our Equifax data breach claim. We believe that many victims could be entitled to thousands of pounds in compensation for the distress and financial losses or expenses caused. We are still able to take new legal cases forward on a No Win, No Fee basis, but time is running out.

Make your Equifax data breach claim

Although years have passed since the breach occurred, there is still time to make your Equifax data breach claim, but we advise that you register as soon as possible to avoid being cut off by any future deadlines. It is vital that Equifax is held to account for exposing victims to significant security risks, stress and anxiety.

All you need to do to start your Equifax data breach claim is to confirm that you received notification that your data was affected by the breach. Then, we can take a few more details to get your compensation claim underway.

We are offering No Win, No Fee representation to all eligible claimants, so join today to be advised by expert group action lawyers.