Equifax’s problems grow: prosecutors open investigation over stock sales

Federal authorities have opened a criminal investigation into the massive data breach at Equifax, which potentially exposed the personal information of up to 143 million Americans, including their Social Security and driver’s license numbers.

Federal prosecutors are examining the nearly $1.8 million in sales of Equifax stock by Chief Financial Officer John Gamble, Joseph Loughran, president of the credit-reporting giant's U.S. Information Solutions division, and Rodolfo Ploder, president of the firm's Workforce Solutions Unit, Bloomberg News reported, citing unidentified people familiar with the investigation.

United States Attorney John A. Horn, the federal prosecutor in Atlanta, said in a statement that his office was working with the F.B.I. to investigate the cyberattack.

Equifax previously said the executives "had no knowledge that an intrusion had occurred" at the time they sold their shares.

The company first publicly disclosed the cyberbreach after financial markets closed on Sept. 7, announcing that personal identifying information for an estimated 143 million U.S. consumers could be compromised by a cybersecurity attack attributed to suspected criminal hackers.

Equifax recently said two senior executives, Chief Information Officer David Webb and Chief Security Officer Susan Mauldin, were already “retiring.”

According to ThinkAdvisor, Atlanta prosecutors, the FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission are all involved in the multiple federal probes into the hacks and the suspicious sales. The Federal Trade Commission has publicly confirmed its own inquiry, saying it usually does not comment on ongoing investigations but wanted to make it known “in light of the intense public interest and the potential impact of this matter.”