According to the Educational Credit Management Corp. (ECMC), a guarantor of federal student loans, "portable media" containing the names, addresses, Social Security numbers and dates of birth of 3.3 million people was stolen from the company sometime during the weekend of March 20th. The breach was detected on the 21st.
Releasing a public statement, Richard Boyle, president and CEO of ECMC "We deeply regret that this incident occurred and the stress it has caused our borrowers and our partners and are doing everything we can to help protect our borrowers' identity and personal information".
The Educational Credit Management Corp. reported the theft of Social Security numbers, names, addresses and other information belonging to some 3.3 million people.
For more info see their Announcement here.
Those with questions about whether they are affected by this data theft can call ECMC toll-free at 1-877-449-3568
Weekdays from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. ET
Saturday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET
Sunday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET.
Visit www.nslds.ed.gov a central database for federal student loans.
If you believe this latest reported data breach (or any of the other regularly "reported" data losses) may soon affect you or anyone in your family, take time to put together a real plan of action aimed at reducing your risk and lessening the blow if an id theft occurs. By taking the time to be proactive now -you can save yourself a lot of time, frustration and money later!
Take control of your identity -before someone else does!
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Releasing a public statement, Richard Boyle, president and CEO of ECMC "We deeply regret that this incident occurred and the stress it has caused our borrowers and our partners and are doing everything we can to help protect our borrowers' identity and personal information".
The Educational Credit Management Corp. reported the theft of Social Security numbers, names, addresses and other information belonging to some 3.3 million people.
For more info see their Announcement here.
Those with questions about whether they are affected by this data theft can call ECMC toll-free at 1-877-449-3568
Weekdays from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. ET
Saturday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET
Sunday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET.
Visit www.nslds.ed.gov a central database for federal student loans.
If you believe this latest reported data breach (or any of the other regularly "reported" data losses) may soon affect you or anyone in your family, take time to put together a real plan of action aimed at reducing your risk and lessening the blow if an id theft occurs. By taking the time to be proactive now -you can save yourself a lot of time, frustration and money later!
Take control of your identity -before someone else does!
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How do we know if we are at risk???
I hope that ECMC attempts to contact those that could be at risk or those that had their information breached.
Thank you for the heads-up.
My daughters identity was stolen though this and her credit is junk already. They offered 1 year of credit reports to aid her. It doesn't seem fair.
Lawsuit is pending...
Email bbarren@verizon.net if you were affected and want to join the suit.
April 29, 2010
CAN YOU BELIEVE one month after the ECMC break in, no conclusory findings?
And, our identities - personal credit information is still floating around? We try to protect our credit, try to pay our bills on time and now we are allowing "GROSS NEGLIGENCE" to occur. A class action law suit is obvious. Lets load the cannon to get the battle rolling so that Congress will pass protective legislation for us.
Should we allow the authorities and the News media to become so complacent? Now we are back "Business as usual."
One student even reported paying off the loan and the payment records were lost. Another student is finding her credit information all over the finance world. Constantly getting unsolicited telephone calls on her private line. Could this also be you? No one can estimate what the long-term affects will be to an individual's loss of identity.
We believe a CLASS-ACTION Law Suit should be initiated. We are accepting actual examples of how you were affected by the theft at ECMC.
VOICE YOUR CONCERNS & JOIN US!
By: Bruce W. Barren
& Monique F. Lis
Please visit http://www.emcohanover.com
Scroll down on left-hand side of the page to: "PRESS-RELEASE" and click
Scroll down to "The Sky Is Falling" and click
You may voice your concerns to us
THANK YOU
The lenders themselves are crooks & pull these highly publicized data breaches in order to cover their own crimes. Sallie mae was indicted in NY for obtaining student data by bribing college financial aid employees. They make quite a bit of their profits from student data by falsely assuming collection of other lenders loans. The student borrower then ends up paying twice for the same loan. Even if the borrower ends up not paying, the government ends up reimbursing the guarantors, so the scheme is a real cash cow.
It doesn't take an Einstein to figure how much easier it is to have a "data breach" instead..
I remember this company (ECMC) used to call constantly to get me to consolidate my student loans but I never would because I didn't trust who I was talking to with my personal information over the phone. And that was back in 2005-2006??? I truly believe something should be done. In 2009,two men came to my house (a different address as previous), claiming they were home remodeling and security installers and mentioned my father's name to me and once they catch on that I was suspicious they hurried up and left!!