Si los recientes ataques de hackers, como el de Equifax, que comprometi\u00f3 los datos personales de casi la mitad de los estadounidenses, han ense\u00f1ado algo, es que las fugas de datos son parte de la vida.<\/p>\n
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If recent hacking attacks such as the one at Equifax, which compromised personal data for about half of all Americans, have taught us anything, it\u2019s that data breaches are a part of life. It\u2019s time to plan for what happens after our data is stolen, according to\u00a0Rahul\u00a0Telang, professor of information systems at Carnegie Mellon University.<\/p>\n
Companies are prone to understating the scale of hacks, which suggests that there needs to be better standards for disclosing breaches. Yahoo recently confessed that its data breach actually impacted 3 billion user accounts,\u00a0three times what it disclosed in December<\/a>. Equifax also boosted the number of people it says were affected by its hack.<\/p>\n The data stolen at Equifax was highly harmful for consumers, compounded by what Telang says was an incompetent response from the company. Equifax first disclosed its\u00a0data breach on Sept. 7\u00a0and says it discovered the unauthorized access on July 29. The firm, which collects data on\u00a0820 million consumers\u00a0and more than 91 million businesses worldwide, said it was concerned about \u201ccopycats\u201d breaking into its systems, an excuse disputed by experts,\u00a0according to the Financial Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n As Telang sees it, a determined hacker is probably going to succeed, yet there\u2019s far too little focus on limiting the damage. Credit freezes could be automatic, and wherever possible data could be aggregated to protect individual identities and private information. The types of fraud-protection services that Equifax sells to customers could be made available to victims as a default.<\/p>\n Government intervention may be necessary, as consumers are vulnerable to the credit raters\u2019 mistakes but have little choice but to accept their role in finance. Consumers aren\u2019t really customers for Equifax\u2014the company\u00a0makes money<\/a>\u00a0from banks and credit card companies that buy data from it.<\/p>\n US senator Elizabeth Warren has said she wants to see the consumer credit rating industry\u2014which is more\u00a0lightly regulated<\/a>\u00a0than banks and credit card companies\u2014completely overhauled<\/a>. \u201cThe incentives in this industry are completely out of whack,\u201d Warren said at a hearing. Equifax \u201ccould actually come out ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n Government intervention may also be needed because companies like Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion aren\u2019t in a particularly competitive industry. They benefit from what economists call \u201cnetwork effects,\u201d meaning the bigger they become, the more financial firms are willing to share data with them, making their services more attractive to buy, according to Telang.<\/p>\n Even vaunted financial technology startups are unlikely to shake up the sector. While newer firms may have better machine-learning technologies or make use of alternative data sources to enhance their algorithms, Telang says their techniques can be copied, and Equifax probably has more data than they do anyway.<\/p>\n \u201cThis market has a propensity to consolidate around a few large firms,\u201d he says. \u201cOne firm having a lot of data can produce more insight than lots of firms that have less data.\u201d<\/p>\n And when valuable data is collected by a few firms, it makes them all the more attractive targets for hackers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n