a free credit freeze at experian and transunion? >> that's correct. >> in other words, equifax won't do anything to provide that. >> again, we're offering all five services plus lock for life. >> well, i guess that answers the question that i was asking, which then leads to my next question which is what is equifax's obligation to consumers who fall victim to identity theft or financial fraud in the future due to this breach, the damage caused to their credit, the money they may lose? how does equifax plan to address the financial harm that can come to our families? >> senator, the design, the thought was offer these five services, allow someone to lock their file for life to minimize the downstream harm. >> what happens if someone is harmed? >> senator, that is the extent of our offering. >> so because of your failure to stop this breach and a family is damaged financially, there will be no compensation provided? >> again, senator, the five services we're offering are for free. the lifetime lock is for free. >> which doesn't touch

in fact, i gave the experian examples and that was just a mistake. but your answer is that, yes, equifax also provides data to those regulators. it's not always voluntary, is it? in other words, you must provide it on occasions when it is required from agencies? >> yes. >> so let me ask you the general question then. as congress looks at this issue, seems to me that it should be obvious we should look much more broadly than even just one private sector company. and even then just the private sector. but to the data collection that is going on across our society, including the data collection that the government itself is collecting. would you agree? >> the rate and pace of cyberattacks is increasing at a rate that is unbelievable. if there's a way for public/private partnership to intelligently sit around a table and debate that and find better ways to manage and secure data, we would welcome that dialogue. >> thank you. i note that senator sasse came in so he'll get the last word. >> i would like to associate myself your comments right there about t

it even enables you to get free identity theft monitoring from protectmyid by experian. imagine the peace of mind you'll have knowing that protectmyid can help detect identity theft and fraud early to minimize its impact and help you regain your good name and credit. it's part of being a aaa member. aaa, a not for profit membership organization, is always there for you 24/7. join, and you'll be part of a community of more than 56 million people in america. for more than 100 years, aaa has been helping motorists like you, advocating for safer roads, safer cars, and safer drivers. i'm sure you've heard of aaa's legendary roadside assistance. you may have even used it for you or your family at home or away. i was coming home from my cabin, my big f350 was loaded up with lots of gear, my family, and all my animals. and, um, it broke down. um, and aaa got there quickly, helped me unload all the, um, animals and equipment, and, uh, got my truck down to the mechanic and turned it in for me at the night drop. the service with aaa, on--on phone service, when i call in, gracious,

encourage trans union and experian to do the same. it is time we change the paradigm and give the power back to the consumer to control who accesses his or her credit data. rep. lujan: i will take that as a no that equifax will not pay for experian and trans union consumers. do you think consumers should have to pay for your mistake, including false credit accounts, fraudulent tax returns, or medical identity theft? do you agree to come visiting any customers that are harmed as a consequence of your breach? mr. smith: i apologize again to the american consumer. we have offered a cumbrian subset of products for free. rep. lujan: will those cumbrian subsets of products make consumers whole? mr. smith: it will protect them going forward. rep. lujan: will it make them whole? yes or no? if someone's credit has been stolen and opened up a bunch of their accounts, bought a bunch of fuel, and this consumer can't fix their history, they have been harmed. in that case, will equifax make that person whole? mr. smith: i have said i apologize. rep

i'll take that for a no, equifax will not pay for experian and transunion. do you think pay for identity theft, false accounts, medical identity theft or do you commit to compensating any consumers who surf harm as a result of your breach. >> we take this seriously. i apologize again to the american consumer. we've offered a con comprehensive set of products for free. >> mr. smith, will those products make consumers whole. >> it will protect them going forward. >> will it make them whole, yes or not? >> it's hard for me to tell if someone has been harmed so i can't answer the question. >> if someone's credit has baseball stolen and someone opened a bunch of accounts, bought cell phones, credit cards, and they can't fix their history, they have been harmed. in that case will ex fax make that person whole? >> congressman, as i said, i apologize. we've offered them a comprehensive -- >> i want to go back to the line of question earlier, in august 11 in your prepared testimony you were aware of a large amount of consumer pii. august 15th, in your prepared testim

i would encourage transunion and experian to do the same. it's time we change the paradigm, give the power back to the consumer to control who accesses his or her credit data, it's the right thing to do. >> i have limited time, i apologize. i'll take that as a know that equifax will not pay for experian and transunion consumers. should consumers have to pay a penalty for your mistake for fraudulent tax returns or medical identity theft or do you commit to compensating any consumer who suffered because of your breach? >> we take this seriously, we've offered a comprehensive set of products for free. >> mr. smith, will those comprehensive sets of products make consumers whole? >> it will protect them going forward? >> will it make them whole? yes or no. >> it's hard for me to fell the someone has been harmed. i can't answer the question. >> if someone's information has been stolen, and someone brought furniture, cell phones and bunch of fuel, now this consumer can't fix their history they've been harmed. in that case will equifax make that per

that's equifax, experian, and transunion.ou can learn how to do this at the website of the ftc. >>> a lot of you clicked on this story today. it's a growing number of stores that will be closed on thanksgiving. in recent years, retailers were trying to get a jump on black friday, by opening on turkey day. dozens of stores have already declared they will not open on thanksgiving. >>> that's wusa9 news at 5:00. the new at 5:30 starts right now. >> we begin with a story that has a lot of you talk being tonight. the famed duke ellington school of the arts. it was impressive on the outside, but inside, a complete mess. bands practicing on the football field. damagessers rehearsing in the -- dancers rehearsing hallways. now it contains the distinction of one of the most expensive remodels in the district. how taxpayers got stuck with $100 million in overruns. >> reporter: ellington is one of the 115 schools part of the district's plan to rebuild, or modernize. since 2016, three mayors set aside money for the construction of these p

equifax, experian and transunion. you've asked us to discuss how credit burrows protect consumer data, but first i wanted to mention the important role played by the national reporting system and our economy. more than two thifrds our gdp comes from consumer spending fueled by consumer credit. it's the national credit reporting system that allows consumers to quickly and effortlessly open a bank account or purchase a cell phone. more than 40% of consumers move every year. and the national credit reporting system facilitates this nobmoekt. in addition to providing fast, fair, impartial access to well priced car, amt apartment rental and other services. nearly 15 years ago congress enacted the fair employment acts to protect consumer privacy and to foster the continued development and vi taltd of the national credit reporting system. the most recent revision to this comprehensive regulatory scheme was the cfpb as a supervisory agency. this was not just examining credit bureaus but examining the users of credit reports a

and one of them wrote me back, experian. they wrote me a very detailed response, which i would like to submit to the record. >> without objection. >> and it explains their patch management system functioned correctly. and when they got the notice from homeland security, they immediately implemented the security patch. they also stated that their patch management system will literally shut down. it won't even work. it shuts down automatically if a patch isn't implemented immediately. so my question is, why didn't your patch management system automatically shut down your systems when the security patch wasn't implemented? why was this flaw allowed to go unpatched for months before you noticed it? >> congresswoman, a patch has got to be identified. we are routinely notified -- >> it was identified by the homeland security department when they notified you. you already testified that your person failed to implement it. >> yeah. i was referring to it's got to be identified by us, not by the outside. either software manufacturer -

it's equifax experian and trans union but i'll give you a one stop shopping go to scam aside dot com my blog and you can go to the scam of the day there's one new one every day for september eighth and what that will do is give you the links to each of them as well as the links to where to get your free credit reports the real free credit reports not the one that you're signing up for a service and you're just presenting your credit card as identification and signing up for other services so one stop shopping scam aside dot com the september eighth scam of the day everything is there three clicks thank you stephen jay jay wiseman i'd like to chat further but i just realized i don't have to work anymore i got email from a nigerian prince apparently i'm audited now who know. there are if it thank you steve. pleasure coming up a moment i both craved and tread i get to interview miss sturgis interview no pressure there but king of talk larry king has some advice you will find valuable this is the big picture on our t. america. i'm going to do just that and you're watching our. swashing b

it's time to end the stranglehold that equifax, transunion and experian have on our consumers' lives. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> chair recognizes gentleman from missouri, mr. lute key marry for and a half minutes. >> i am right here. a lot of us to keep track of. you have sat before several committees and i trust you've heard the anger from congress and the american people. it's nottus incompetence on the part of you and your company but also negligence and disregard for the law and consumers. there is a failure on the part of you, your board and your senior management, and your failures have impacted more than one-third of the american people. what's most egregious to me is that the american people's data had potentially been compromised had to wait more than a month to find out about it. the american public deserves prompt notification. they deserve a system that effectively and efficiently notifies them, not one that is slowed down because of turf wars, regulatory conflicts or fear of litigation. i believe it's now time to move forward, and we need to find solutions to this pro

we also know of a breach at experian involving t-mobile. so there are breaches that occur, and we'll come up with a number as to how freely they occur, but to the best of my knowledge, there's never been a breach of a consumer reporting agency database. >> and that's splitting hairs for the consumers, i don't think there's any doubt about it. >> it's an important policy -- after the investigations conclude that the consumer reporting agency wasn't breached, after equifax was subjected this announcement of eattack. >> let's say that you reported to the fbi, what is the typical guidelines or strategies that any of these credit agencies, any of them would basically go to, do you have like a fire drill, in other words? do you have a system in place that will lock down and protect data? >> right, so now of course i can't speak for any particular company, but the companies with which i'm familiar with incident response plans, and they have a table top exercise, where all the stake holders are at the table and we run through what's the public stat

called on the private sector to at least can't pay raises the same as the your previous japan has experian. twenty years of on and off deflation the country's inflation goal is two percent but right now it's trailing at near zero that is in spite of five years of stimulus measures. and the political sparring and rising tension between spain and its catalonian region continues to escalate the situation in spain became even more complicated on friday when a secret vote took place in catalans parliament r t correspondent charlotte dubinsky has more there is confusion in counselor about whether this is now an independent republic or still call to say that's because on friday members of the council on call and free to do declare independence that vote was held in secret and some members of the parliament will be used to take part walking out of the building of the eighty's that state seventy voted for independence and that motion was cost now there were cheers on the streets for thousands of pro independence supporters but in madrid the reaction was very different the spanish prime minister las

equifax, transunion and experian, so when you talk about this new lifetime lock product, it's not going to be effective unless everybody does it. i wish i had more time, but we're going to clean this mess up and we're going to restore the integrity and the trust of the american people. >> time for the gentleman has expired. now acknowledges the gentleman from illinois. >> thank you, mr. chairman, i know many of us have been hearing from our constituents, i certainly have, marty says equifax has, they should have done it for me or pay me to do given away my private information. they should have done it for me or pay me to do all this of signing up and paying for these credit reports? someone should go to jail for this. another constituent said, this careless actions caused the loss of personal information on a scale never seen before, because they failed to patch their servers for a known problem, combined with the careless handling of highly sensitive personal information, their action went far beyond carelessness to negligence. legislation should be put forward to increase regulation o

on the downside you have expe experian i guess we don't have sectors? there we go, oil and gas and tell kons mo tellcons are ticking up. and many reports suggest that donald trump could decertify the trade deal today we'll see what comes out of the press conference or statement rather autos are the only sector lower to the tune of 0.2%. let's go to the market strategist and jpmorgan asset management we have seen how the inflows for european equities are slower, the spannish equities are lower this is probably not a surprise given the chaos happening in spain, but redemptions are the highest since the second quarter 2015 does this whole catalonia issue put this success in doubt? >> i'm not too worried about it. if you look at the numbers, 90% of the people who turned out to vote wanted independence but actually only 43% people turned out to vote overall, less than 40% of catalonia who wants to leave before the referendum suggested 35% to 40% of the people wanted to leave the other key thing here is even if they wanted to leave, spain is very unlikely to

for the three of us in this case, ourselves, trans union, experian, to work together to provide a seamless solution, free, to consumers for life. senator tillis: to single out the free locks for life question mark -- life? yes.mith: senator tillis: what about -- we have honest debate on the social security number name and date of birth. in 2017, a secure way, a private way to protect someone's i.d., or is there a better solution. senator tillis: it needs to get into this industry, particularly when remediation efforts require rendering parts of your social security number. back on the link lock for life, -- lock for life, is that simply preventing my information from being disseminated to anybody inquiry about my creditworthiness, or should it opt out to provide services to your customers? mr. smith: if you lock your identity fraudts against you as an individual. if you go to get a job these days, you have to have access to your credit report. credit card, home equity, mortgage. it prevents fraudulent activity. way to preventre identity theft. senator tillis: and the final question -- i am

stephen pat experian is being sent to stanford university for a month-long examination after an autopsyes. it's likely to not such a light on a motive so tell me what this is. well, for five months, i spent an uneasy time in alderson federal prison, i guess it's called. i can't even remember the name. but, to pass the time, i took up whatever i could possibly take up. - mm-hmm. - reading; it was like a great reading vacation. but i also took pottery. ceramics it's called there. wait, wait, wait, you made these in prison? i did. you were allowed to make three pieces of ceramics in five months. but i persuaded the powers-that-be that this was one piece because you couldn't just do three of them, you had to do the whole thing. so i think there's 12 pieces or 15 pieces. so this is a nativity scene? this is a nativity, um... figures for a crèche, a christmas crèche. - but this is so intricate. - aren't they beautiful? oh, my god. and you had to ship it out you know, and you had to wrap everything. and nothing got broken - i was so pleased that... - ( laughs ) you know, these are so great. lo

encourage, to be clear, i would encourage trans union, experian and others to do the same.ive power back to the consumer to control who accesses his or her credit data. knowwill take that as a that equifax will not pay for experienced and trans union -- experian and trans union users. this very seriously. i have apologized, and i will apologize again to the american consumer. we are offering a comprehensive set of products for free. >> will those products make consumers whole? >> it will protect them going forward. >> will it make them whole? tell if hard for me to someone has been harmed. i cannot answer the question. >> if someone opened up an ofount and bought a lot furniture, tools, that consumer whose data was stolen has been harmed. will equifax make them whole? >> comes in, i have apologized -- -- congressman, i have apologized -- >> ok, thank you very much. host: you can find that full hearing online at www.c-span.org . that testimony and hearing about the data breach at equifax. one of the people at the hearing who got to speak with richard smith was leonard lance.

norms and procedures that are essential to maintain the constitution, and he actively, every day, experian's and exhibit's contempt to the notion of republic under law, in which he is equal, not about everybody else. he fundamentally mistakes the understanding of the presidency , in waysited states that makes everyone externally nervous. the rhetoric that this man has , his praise of a man who was extrajudicially -- who has extrajudicially killed thousands of people, surely you are troubled by the rhetoric and tone of this person. surely, you are troubled by a president who tells officers to abuse something. surely, there are some lines you don't want a president across. >> there are some things i wish he wouldn't say everything will day. [laughter] [crosstalk] >> did you read the editorial page? we do come on a daily basis, point out things that make him a real head -- a real poo poo head. but they do not become law. they do nothing come action. prewitt,met's inky, any of the people that he has installed in these positions. they are the folks making the decisions and running the government.

equifax, transunion and experian, so when you talk about this new lifetime lock product, it's not going to be effective unless everybody does it. i wish i had more time, but we're going to clean this mess up and we're going to restore the integrity and the trust of the american people. >> time for the gentleman has expired. now acknowledges the gentleman from illinois. >> thank you, mr. chairman, i know many of us have been hearing from our constituents, i certainly have, marty says equifax has, they should have done it for me or pay me to do given away my private information. they should have done it for me or pay me to do all this of signing up and paying for these credit reports? someone should go to jail for this. another constituent said, this careless actions caused the loss of personal information on a scale never seen before, because they failed to patch their servers for a known problem, combined with the careless handling of highly sensitive personal information, their action went far beyond carelessness to negligence. legislation should be put forward to increase regulation o

probly one but one that checks all three of the bureaus 'cause there's two others transunion and experianure nobody opens up credit in your name. they could also maybe try to access your existing account that you already have 'cause they now have your name, your address, your birthday, your social security number. >> they don't need much nowadays. >> they don't and remember, this information doesn't expire. you might not be compromised for five or six years so you got to be looking at everything now forever. >> yeah. so, some take aways for viewers. hopefully many know this because hopefully people are doing their homework but we'll go to a simple tip. number one starts with a strong password not just for equifax but >> the security experts say you should have a different password for everything. >> i can't remember my single password half the time. >> i know. there are password managers also called password vaults and they are apps. >> so you have to have a password to get into your passwords. >> yes, but it's better than using the same password for everything. don't we all do that. >> w

there have been similar type of breaches in the fast experian had a breach a couple years ago, a muchne admittedly we sea thie things like the tart breach and so forth. in terms of legal costs and fines, those hits have been material ultimately manageable for those companies. i think, frankly, that's going to be the case for equifax as well >> brett, yesterday, sheila bair, the former fdic chair, joined us and mentioned she thought bank-like regulation could be coming for these companies. and why shouldn't it and if it does, does that significantly change the earnings power >> well, i think thabs tt's the other component of it, what are the ongoing cost i think it's certainly safe to assume there's going to be an increased focus on security, going to be higher spending around security. whether that's at the company's own initiative, or, you know, through government mandates. so i do think it's fair to assume that, you know, there will be a long-term margin hit from this as well. >> leo, what do you think the long-term security aspect implications of this should be both for equifax, bu

should they -- should investors believe that the likes of a trans union and an experian wil have to facequif equifax's bad acts >> let's hope that the other companies, if this were to occur, would inform the public as soon as possible. i'm not suggesting that it has occurred, but as you suggest, maybe the model should change. certainly the other companies, i'm sure, will be monitoring the hearing today. >> all right congressman lance,ing we appreciate your time >> thank you very much >>> coming up, we're going to speak to another security expert, fred burton, about protecting soft targets. later, wells fargo ceo tim sloan heads to capitol hill this morning. what investors can expect when he is grilled by lawmakers all is leading up to our big interview with the biggest shareholder of wells fargo stock. the biggest shareholder of like every stock. not really, but he could be if he wanted. warren buffer et "squawk box" will be right back. whether it's connecting one of the world's most innovative campuses. or bringing wifi to 65,000 fans. businesses count on communication, and communicatio

i think most people don't understand -- experian and trans union, who are also collecting this data. why do consumers have to pay you to access their credit report? why shouldn't they do not be free? mr. smith: the consumer has the ability to access the credit report for free from each of the three credit reporting agencies once a year. you combine that with the ability to lock your credit file for life for free, again is a step forward. rep. dingell: i am running out of time. when you find mistakes, which a number of us have, and we are luckier than others, it is difficult to fix. we need a longer debate about who owns this data and how we educate the american people. rep. latta: the chair now recognizes the gentleman from new jersey for five minutes. >> good morning to you, mr. smith. criminals perpetrated this fraud. is it possible these criminals are from another country? mr. smith: congressman, it is possible, but it this time -- >> it is possible. is it possible it is the government of another country? mr. smith: as i mentioned, we have engaged the f ei. they will make that con