15 ms·

Wow placing a freeze requires filling out a PDF form, attaching a scan of your ID, and then sending it in over email, mail, or fax. The PDF lacks built in form

by varenc 5y ago

Wow placing a freeze requires filling out a PDF form, attaching a scan of your ID, and then sending it in over email, mail, or fax. The PDF lacks built in form fields you can type in. The extra friction is probably a feature: https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Employment_Data_Freeze_Placement_Form.pdf https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Empl... (the exif data on that PDF shows the name of the employee that created it and that they used Word 2010...) The Equifax CCPA request process on the other hand is very smooth and automated. Though doesn't seem like it's including Work Number information: https://myprivacy.equifax.com/ https://myprivacy.equifax.com/

drunner 5y ago
At least they let you mail or email. I faxed them 4 times in 6 months to verify my identity because they have me confused with someone else and eventually just gave up. They said any other alternative was not supported.
- LurkersWillLurk 5y ago
  You can contact a consumer law attorney to get this fixed. There is an attorney's fees provision in the FCRA which will make it economical to pursue the remedy.
gruez 5y ago
>The extra friction is probably a feature: https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Empl https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Empl... (the exif data on that PDF shows the name of the employee that created it and that they used Word 2010...) I don't get it. how is "PDF shows the name of the employee that created it and that they used Word 2010" relevant to the claim that "extra friction is probably a feature"?
- haswell 5y ago
  Just speculating here, but I wonder if their point is that they went out of their way to create a PDF that is as unusable as possible, and that Word 2010 is somehow required to create such a PDF. A few simpler explanations: - Equifax IT hasn't rolled out modern O365 apps - The form was created a long time ago, and has not been updated Regardless of the exif data, I do believe that friction is absolutely a feature in this process, but I also think the Word 2010 angle is tenuous at best.
  - varenc 5y ago
    No angle or point with that comment. Just interesting! I like looking at exif data. And I think there should be more awareness around what it often leaks.
  - mesozoic 5y ago
    Probably it's buried in a ticket deep in the feature requests lists and has zero potential revenue impact (or negative) so it isn't prioritized.
  - wonderhamster 5y ago
    I've worked on these kinds of systems, but not this one explicitly. There is always a discussion about how to make it(legally) more difficult for users to do something you don't want them to do. It's not paranoia, it's reality.
staunch 5y ago
When I submit the myprivacy.equifax.com validation it hangs at "Processing..." indefinitely. #AbolishCreditAgencies
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- gumby 5y ago
  #AbolishCreditAgencies Things were bad, or worse, before they existed. Every little town had one (I remember walking past Palo Alto’s downtown; it was just a storefront with a bunch of file cabinets). Getting credit was slow and complicated and really a pain when you moved. And before that, even into the mid 20th century, getting credit was all about your network. And remember how much people complain about VCs relying on intros rather than cold calls…well that’s how the entire financial system used to work. Yes the credit agencies are abusive and lazy and need serious reform and legal management, but they also provide valuable services. I believe it is possible to have the latter and fix the former.
- varenc 5y ago
  Check if an ad blocker might be interfering? I finished my CCPA request in ~2 minutes and it only required that I do SMS verification. Presumably because the name, phone, address, and email all matched records they had on file for me...
  - adrr 5y ago
    You can just send them an email as defined in the CCPA. Why even give them your cell or SSN.
  - koolba 5y ago
    There’s a special caliber of crappy site that only functions when ad-blocking is enabled. My working theory is that the sites are so bad, they rely on the ads to provide their dependencies as global. Block the ads and you’ve blocked the ancient version jquery the main site needs loaded of function.
luckydata 5y ago
well there's no law that forces them to make it easy.
- olliej 5y ago
  There’s also no law that requires it be true or accurate. What a great system! :-/
  - nopenopenopeno 5y ago
    Yeah, capitalism is a nightmare.
    - robertlagrant 5y ago
      Capitalism generally happens successfully in societies with laws. The difference with socialism is the state both defines the laws and decides how to allocate resources, which tends to result in a lot of poverty.
      - thesuitonym 5y ago
        Government isn't an outside entity. Government is the people--except in a capitalist country where government is owned by corporations.
        p1esk 5y ago
        By your logic, corporations are people too
        olliej 5y ago
        That is indeed what the US Supreme Court agrees with you. Except of course corporations don't go to jail for committing crime.
        5y ago
snitch182 5y ago
And then they have all of that as well ready to be breached!
konschubert 5y ago
With GDPR you could just send them a formless deletion request. There are good parts in GDPR for sure.
- dheera 5y ago
  GDPR is an EU law and does not have legal legs in the US.
  - BossingAround 5y ago
    Depends. Do they have EU citizens in their database? GDPR is an EU law that applies to EU citizens around the world, including the US. If you are a non-EU citizen, you can't claim GDPR of course. If you are an EU citizen, you can claim GDPR regardless of the residence of the company AFAIK. Enforcement of GDPR is a different matter. I am not sure whom I'd complain to, other than my representative in the European parliament. I could probably sue them though, if I found my data there and they refused to comply with my GDPR request.
    - lmkg 5y ago
      GDPR works the opposite of how you think it does. EU residents can claim rights under GDPR regardless of citizenship, and EU citizens in other countries are granted no protections. (I'm not sure about how it works for people whose location is transient, e.g. people on vacations.) Companies outside of the EU can become subject to GDPR by targeting EU residents. You can always raise a complaint to the data privacy regulator for the EU country where you currently reside, and GDPR has a mechanism to forward that to the relevant authority.
    - dheera 5y ago
      > that applies to EU citizens around the world, including the US No. To give a counterexample, there are EU citizens in China, and most internet companies in China don't care a fvck about GDPR, especially Tencent. You bet your conversations on WeChat are logged, sometimes subjected to censorship, and more, it's just how things work. Heck, there are even laws in China that are fully contradictory to GDPR, and the local laws take precedence, regardless of what citizenship you have, if you are physically within the borders you are subject to local laws. The US isn't any different from China here. The EU doesn't get to enforce its laws in China, and it doesn't get to enforce its laws in the US. They aren't the world police. That said, I'm not saying GDPR is bad, just that the US needs to have its own version of it in US law. What is bad is letting the EU enforce laws outside their borders. China doesn't, and neither should the US.
nip 5y ago
Shameless plug [1] that hopefully provides value: simplePDF.eu [2] will allow you to fill it in more easily (the fields are already set) [1] It's a side-project of mine [2] https://www.simplepdf.eu/editor?open=https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Employment_Data_Freeze_Placement_Form.pdf https://www.simplepdf.eu/editor?open=https://assets.equifax....
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- programmertote 5y ago
  Just making sure, the site will NOT save the data that I entered in the PDF? Thank you for sharing your side-project!
  - nip 5y ago
    You’re welcome! Indeed, the website will NOT save the data that you entered in the PDF. In fact neither the data you enter nor the PDF that gets loaded is ever seen by my server: everything happens locally (including the actual PDF generation) [1] Privacy is one of the key distinctive feature of simplePDF — The only thing that is saved is a fingerprint of the document that allows to match the field types and their respective positions (x,y, type of field, width, height…) If you want to see it in action: 1. Download the Equifax form on your computer 2. Navigate here https://simplePDF.eu/editor https://simplePDF.eu/editor 3. Load the PDF from your computer 4. Because the document fingerprint is “known”, the field types and positions are automatically retrieved from the server [1] You may notice that after a browser refresh the data you entered is still there: that’s because it’s saved locally in the local storage of your web browser — Unrelated: some people have reported that the save button is not displayed in some cases: trying refreshing the page – I’ll work on a fix as soon as possible
- gleb 5y ago
  Neat! How do I save in the filled out PDF??
  - 5y ago

by varenc 5y ago

drunner 5y ago

At least they let you mail or email. I faxed them 4 times in 6 months to verify my identity because they have me confused with someone else and eventually just gave up. They said any other alternative was not supported.

LurkersWillLurk 5y ago
You can contact a consumer law attorney to get this fixed. There is an attorney's fees provision in the FCRA which will make it economical to pursue the remedy.

gruez 5y ago

>The extra friction is probably a feature: https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Empl https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Empl... (the exif data on that PDF shows the name of the employee that created it and that they used Word 2010...) I don't get it. how is "PDF shows the name of the employee that created it and that they used Word 2010" relevant to the claim that "extra friction is probably a feature"?

haswell 5y ago
Just speculating here, but I wonder if their point is that they went out of their way to create a PDF that is as unusable as possible, and that Word 2010 is somehow required to create such a PDF. A few simpler explanations: - Equifax IT hasn't rolled out modern O365 apps - The form was created a long time ago, and has not been updated Regardless of the exif data, I do believe that friction is absolutely a feature in this process, but I also think the Word 2010 angle is tenuous at best.
- varenc 5y ago
  No angle or point with that comment. Just interesting! I like looking at exif data. And I think there should be more awareness around what it often leaks.
- mesozoic 5y ago
  Probably it's buried in a ticket deep in the feature requests lists and has zero potential revenue impact (or negative) so it isn't prioritized.
- wonderhamster 5y ago
  I've worked on these kinds of systems, but not this one explicitly. There is always a discussion about how to make it(legally) more difficult for users to do something you don't want them to do. It's not paranoia, it's reality.

staunch 5y ago

When I submit the myprivacy.equifax.com validation it hangs at "Processing..." indefinitely. #AbolishCreditAgencies

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
gumby 5y ago
#AbolishCreditAgencies Things were bad, or worse, before they existed. Every little town had one (I remember walking past Palo Alto’s downtown; it was just a storefront with a bunch of file cabinets). Getting credit was slow and complicated and really a pain when you moved. And before that, even into the mid 20th century, getting credit was all about your network. And remember how much people complain about VCs relying on intros rather than cold calls…well that’s how the entire financial system used to work. Yes the credit agencies are abusive and lazy and need serious reform and legal management, but they also provide valuable services. I believe it is possible to have the latter and fix the former.
varenc 5y ago
Check if an ad blocker might be interfering? I finished my CCPA request in ~2 minutes and it only required that I do SMS verification. Presumably because the name, phone, address, and email all matched records they had on file for me...
- adrr 5y ago
  You can just send them an email as defined in the CCPA. Why even give them your cell or SSN.
- koolba 5y ago
  There’s a special caliber of crappy site that only functions when ad-blocking is enabled. My working theory is that the sites are so bad, they rely on the ads to provide their dependencies as global. Block the ads and you’ve blocked the ancient version jquery the main site needs loaded of function.

luckydata 5y ago

well there's no law that forces them to make it easy.

olliej 5y ago
There’s also no law that requires it be true or accurate. What a great system! :-/
- nopenopenopeno 5y ago
  Yeah, capitalism is a nightmare.
  - robertlagrant 5y ago
    Capitalism generally happens successfully in societies with laws. The difference with socialism is the state both defines the laws and decides how to allocate resources, which tends to result in a lot of poverty.
    - thesuitonym 5y ago
      Government isn't an outside entity. Government is the people--except in a capitalist country where government is owned by corporations.
      - p1esk 5y ago
        By your logic, corporations are people too
        olliej 5y ago
        That is indeed what the US Supreme Court agrees with you. Except of course corporations don't go to jail for committing crime.
        5y ago

snitch182 5y ago

And then they have all of that as well ready to be breached!

konschubert 5y ago

With GDPR you could just send them a formless deletion request. There are good parts in GDPR for sure.

dheera 5y ago
GDPR is an EU law and does not have legal legs in the US.
- BossingAround 5y ago
  Depends. Do they have EU citizens in their database? GDPR is an EU law that applies to EU citizens around the world, including the US. If you are a non-EU citizen, you can't claim GDPR of course. If you are an EU citizen, you can claim GDPR regardless of the residence of the company AFAIK. Enforcement of GDPR is a different matter. I am not sure whom I'd complain to, other than my representative in the European parliament. I could probably sue them though, if I found my data there and they refused to comply with my GDPR request.
  - lmkg 5y ago
    GDPR works the opposite of how you think it does. EU residents can claim rights under GDPR regardless of citizenship, and EU citizens in other countries are granted no protections. (I'm not sure about how it works for people whose location is transient, e.g. people on vacations.) Companies outside of the EU can become subject to GDPR by targeting EU residents. You can always raise a complaint to the data privacy regulator for the EU country where you currently reside, and GDPR has a mechanism to forward that to the relevant authority.
  - dheera 5y ago
    > that applies to EU citizens around the world, including the US No. To give a counterexample, there are EU citizens in China, and most internet companies in China don't care a fvck about GDPR, especially Tencent. You bet your conversations on WeChat are logged, sometimes subjected to censorship, and more, it's just how things work. Heck, there are even laws in China that are fully contradictory to GDPR, and the local laws take precedence, regardless of what citizenship you have, if you are physically within the borders you are subject to local laws. The US isn't any different from China here. The EU doesn't get to enforce its laws in China, and it doesn't get to enforce its laws in the US. They aren't the world police. That said, I'm not saying GDPR is bad, just that the US needs to have its own version of it in US law. What is bad is letting the EU enforce laws outside their borders. China doesn't, and neither should the US.

nip 5y ago

Shameless plug [1] that hopefully provides value: simplePDF.eu [2] will allow you to fill it in more easily (the fields are already set) [1] It's a side-project of mine [2] https://www.simplepdf.eu/editor?open=https://assets.equifax.com/wfs/theworknumber/assets/twn_Employment_Data_Freeze_Placement_Form.pdf https://www.simplepdf.eu/editor?open=https://assets.equifax....

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
programmertote 5y ago
Just making sure, the site will NOT save the data that I entered in the PDF? Thank you for sharing your side-project!
- nip 5y ago
  You’re welcome! Indeed, the website will NOT save the data that you entered in the PDF. In fact neither the data you enter nor the PDF that gets loaded is ever seen by my server: everything happens locally (including the actual PDF generation) [1] Privacy is one of the key distinctive feature of simplePDF — The only thing that is saved is a fingerprint of the document that allows to match the field types and their respective positions (x,y, type of field, width, height…) If you want to see it in action: 1. Download the Equifax form on your computer 2. Navigate here https://simplePDF.eu/editor https://simplePDF.eu/editor 3. Load the PDF from your computer 4. Because the document fingerprint is “known”, the field types and positions are automatically retrieved from the server [1] You may notice that after a browser refresh the data you entered is still there: that’s because it’s saved locally in the local storage of your web browser — Unrelated: some people have reported that the save button is not displayed in some cases: trying refreshing the page – I’ll work on a fix as soon as possible
gleb 5y ago
Neat! How do I save in the filled out PDF??
- 5y ago