Former Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Equifax
Search every verified Richard Smith interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Former Equifax CEO Richard Smith testified before Congress in 2017 and 2018 regarding a data breach that compromised personal information of over 145 million Americans. Smith stated that the criminal hack "happened on my watch" and said he took "full responsibility" for the incident. He apologized to affected consumers and attributed the breach to a combination of human error, including a failure to apply a software patch, and technological error involving a scanner that failed to detect the vulnerability. During questioning, Smith said that Equifax's general counsel and other executives who sold stock in early August 2017 did not know it was a breach at the time, describing the incident as "suspicious activity" with no indication that personally identifiable information had been compromised. Smith stated that upon his retirement he agreed to step down with no further compensation, no bonus, and no severance. In a separate hearing, Senator Elizabeth Warren questioned Smith about Equifax's profits, which Smith confirmed had increased by more than 80 percent since 2013 despite multiple data breaches. Smith also acknowledged that Equifax receives revenue from LifeLock, a credit monitoring service that saw increased enrollment after the breach.
“congressman that's correct it's a three billion dollar company data on 820 million customers worldwide”
“congressman as I alluded to my opening comments and the recent written testimony there was a human error and a technology er that did not allow us to identify”
“The criminal hack happened on my watch and as CEO I'm ultimately responsible and I take full responsibility. I'm here today to say to each and every person affected by this breach I'm truly and deeply sorry for what happened.”
“We developed a new service available on January 31st, 2018 that will give all consumers the power to control access to their credit data by allowing them to lock and unlock their credit files when they want. They can do that for free for life. Putting the power to control access to credit data in the hands of the Ameri...”
“Yes, in order is yeah so the breach of your system has actually created more business opportunities for you for example millions of people have signed up for the credit monitoring service that you announced after the breach.”
“Yes sir yes it has gone up right in fact it's gone up by more than 80 percent over that time.”
“All right congressman we get notifications routinely, the IT team and security team do to apply applications. This individual, as I mentioned earlier, did not communicate to the right level to apply the patch.”
“Worldwide yes sir, I think someone mentioned earlier it's a public number out there, over eight hundred and some-odd million consumers and 100 million companies roughly.”
“We know now that this criminal attack was made possible because a combination of human error, technological error. Human error involved a failure to apply software patch or dispute portal in March of 2017. Technological error involved a scanner which failed to detect that vulnerability on that particular portal. Both e...”
“As we've all painfully learned, data security's a national security problem. Putting the consumer control of their credit data is a first step towards a long-term solution to the industry the problem of identity theft, but no single company can solve a larger problem on its own. I believe we need a public-private partn...”
“The only knowledge I have is he was notified on the 31st there was suspicious activity in a consumer dispute portal. To the best of my knowledge, they did not know when they cleared their trades. I would come back to it again, he did not know it was a breach when he approved it. He knew at the time it was suspicious ac...”
“I agreed to step down at that time with no further compensation. I agreed I should not get a bonus, I agreed it would be no severance. I asked for nothing beyond what I'd already earned.”
“The criminal hack happened on my watch and as CEO I am ultimately responsible and I take full responsibility. I'm here today to say to each and every person affected by this breach I'm truly and deeply sorry for what happened.”
“We know now that this criminal attack was made possible because a combination of human error and technological error. Human error involved a failure to apply a software patch on a dispute portal in March of 2017. Technological error involved a scanner which failed to detect that vulnerability on that particular portal.”
“It's time we changed the paradigm, give the power back to the consumer to control who accesses his or her credit data.”
October 03, 2017 C-SPAN News http://MOXNews.com Former Equifax CEO Richard Smith testified before a House Energy & Commerce subcommittee on the credit ratings agency's data breach that put the personal and financial records of more than 140 million consumers at risk for theft. Subcommittee members focused their questions on the delay between Equifax detecting the cyberattack on its data systems and in notifying customers of the breach. This was one of four congressional hearings Mr. Smith was scheduled to testify at in a week's time. MOX NEWS NEEDS YOUR HELP TO CONTINUE!! NEW! My Patreon Pa…
Banking Committee hearing. October 4th, 2017.
Former Equifax CEO Richard Smith testifies to the House Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection Subcommittee. » Subscribe ...
In front of the House Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection Subcommittee, former Equifax CEO Richard Smith answers questions from Subcommittee Vice Chair Rep. Gregg Harper (R-Miss.). » Subscribe to CNBC: http://cnb.cx/SubscribeCNBC About CNBC: From 'Wall Street' to 'Main Street' to award winning original documentaries and Reality TV series, CNBC has you covered. Experience special sneak peeks of your favorite shows, exclusive video and more. Connect with CNBC News Online Get the latest news: http://www.cnbc.com/ Find CNBC News on Facebook: http://cnb.cx/LikeCNBC Follow CNBC News on Twitte…
Former Equifax CEO Richard Smith testifies on Capitol Hill over the company's data massive breach.
In front of the House Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection Subcommittee, former Equifax CEO Richard Smith answers questions from Subcommittee Ranking Member Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-Ill.) » Subscribe to CNBC: http://cnb.cx/SubscribeCNBC About CNBC: From 'Wall Street' to 'Main Street' to award winning original documentaries and Reality TV series, CNBC has you covered. Experience special sneak peeks of your favorite shows, exclusive video and more. Connect with CNBC News Online Get the latest news: http://www.cnbc.com/ Find CNBC News on Facebook: http://cnb.cx/LikeCNBC Follow CNBC News on…
Richard Smith will face tough questions about the massive data breach when he appears before the House House Energy and ...
In front of the House Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection Subcommittee, former Equifax CEO Richard Smith answers questions from Rep. Ben Lujan (D-N.M.) » Subscribe to CNBC: http://cnb.cx/SubscribeCNBC About CNBC: From 'Wall Street' to 'Main Street' to award winning original documentaries and Reality TV series, CNBC has you covered. Experience special sneak peeks of your favorite shows, exclusive video and more. Connect with CNBC News Online Get the latest news: http://www.cnbc.com/ Find CNBC News on Facebook: http://cnb.cx/LikeCNBC Follow CNBC News on Twitter: http://cnb.cx/FollowCNBC F…
Sign in to search the full transcript archive, filter by topic, and access every quote from Richard Smith.
The summary and quote tags on this profile are produced with AI assistance from verified, first-person interview transcripts, then checked by our team to confirm the speaker's identity and the accuracy of every quote. See how we verify →