Fraudsters Exploited Lax Security at Equifax’s TALX Payroll Division
Summary: Identity thieves reset 4-digit PINs on Equifax subsidiary TALX's payroll portal by correctly answering personal knowledge-based authentication questions, then used the access to steal W-2 tax data between April 17, 2016 and March 29, 2017. At least five organizations received notification letters, including Northrop Grumman, Allegis Group, Saint-Gobain Corp., Erickson Living and the University of Louisville, while Equifax declined to say how many consumers or customers were affected.
Key Takeaway: The IRS issued more than $490 million in fraudulent refunds in 2015 through its own Get Transcript feature, which also relied primarily on Equifax-provided knowledge-based questions - the same weak authentication that let thieves walk into TALX accounts holding W-2 data for defense contractors and universities.
Read the original at Krebs on Security ↗
- Topics
- Data Breaches
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