Well a new lawsuit claims millions of Americans Nationwide may have had their Personal information compromised in a Large scale hack the hacking group known As us dood says it compromised nearly Three billion records including people's Social Security numbers the group Allegedly targeted the system of National public data back in April the Company is used by businesses and Investigators to do background checks It's currently unclear exactly how many People were affected CBS News senior Business and Technology correspondent Jolene Kent is in Los Angeles for more On this joling it's not just Social Security numbers what was Taken yeah Social Security numbers past And current addresses names of siblings All kinds of information was taken the Good news is is finally this Organization has acknowledged that this Did happen and they do plan after this Lawsuit was filed to notify people Who've been affected but what you really Want to do when it comes to protecting Yourself in this situation is a lot of The things we've always talked about but This is also coming recommended by the Organization that was targeted you want To freeze your credit first and foremost I know it sounds like it could be Complicated but it's actually very Simple it's free you want to do that
With all three credit bureaus and we're Talking about 2.7 billion records that Were accessed it could very well have Affected you chances are yes your social Security number your past addresses your Current addresses are probably already Out there available on the dark web but What you want to do is do that freezing Equifax Experian and Transunion do the Credit security freeze as soon as you Can okay I'm just writing this down Because I need to make sure that I do This um so is this something that Everybody should do regardless of Whether you think you may have been part Of this hack would you know if your Information was part of this hack yeah National national public data says that They will inform those who have been Affected but you know that can take a Long time and so if you just want to Take precautions you can set up dark web Monitoring on your accounts on on your Information but you can also just go Ahead and preemptively freeze your Credit if you haven't done so already With so many hacks a lot of people have Already done this and then the way you Can access your credit of course is to Call and unfreeze it when you're trying To do a major transaction whether you're Trying to buy a new car with a car loan Or you know purchase a home uh have your Credit looked at when it comes to a
Renting as well you mentioned our all of Our information is probably already on The dark web makes makes me feel just Kind of vulnerable I mean how does Something like this happen a scale of This magnitude and and is that the right Question we should be asking if Something like this is so ubiquitous now You know talking to so many cyber Security Experts including Chris Krebs Here at CBS News the the general Consensus is assume your data is out There and act accordingly and so what You want to do is maintain good password Hygiene you want to Institute credit Monitoring freeze your credit use two Factor authentication and just just Basically play defense for yourself Because basically it is very easy to Access your information and now because So many different hacks have happened Affecting hundreds of millions of people Here in the US and around the world it's Actually pretty easy for bundlers Essentially to take your information and Continue to sell it or triangulate and Target you in a more effective way so You just want to make sure that you're Taking all of these simple steps and you Know refresh maybe set a set a date in Your calendar every 6 months or so to Redo this and and make sure that you're Maintaining that good online security Hygiene because unfortunately the
Reality is your information is probably Up there somewhere I hate to tell you Makes me think of bundles in a whole new Way nefarious bundles in this case Jolie And Kent thank you thanks
