Congress finds data brokers cost consumers tens of billions of dollars - DataBreaches.Net

"Breaches at data brokers have cost American consumers more than $20 billion, Congress's Joint Economic Committee revealed Friday as part of an investigation triggered by The Markup and CalMatters. The estimated losses stem from identity theft linked to just four recent data breaches involving major brokers, the committee said in a report."

"The committee followed up directly on the Markup and CalMatters' reporting, which in August showed how data brokers were hiding from search engines legally-mandated pages where Californians can request that the brokers delete or stop selling their data. Shortly after that story was published, New Hampshire Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan sent a letter pressing some brokers to explain their practices."

"Data brokers, as defined in the California law that requires brokers to provide consumers the so-called 'opt out' pages, are companies that gather data on consumers, then sell that data to other companies who do not have a direct relationship with the consumers. Typically, companies buy such information from data brokers for marketing purposes."

Congress's Joint Economic Committee revealed that breaches at data brokers have cost American consumers more than $20 billion, with losses stemming from identity theft linked to four recent major broker breaches. The investigation was triggered by reporting from The Markup and CalMatters in collaboration with WIRED, which exposed how data brokers were hiding legally-mandated opt-out pages from search engines. Following this reporting, Senator Maggie Hassan pressed brokers to explain their practices. In response, four major data brokers engaged with congressional staff and changed their practices to make it easier for consumers to control their data usage and opt out of databases.

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