X

Equifax hackers took driver's license info on 10M Americans

The attackers also took more than 145 million Social Security numbers, along with other pieces of personal info.

Laura Hautala Former Senior Writer
Laura wrote about e-commerce and Amazon, and she occasionally covered cool science topics. Previously, she broke down cybersecurity and privacy issues for CNET readers. Laura is based in Tacoma, Washington, and was into sourdough before the pandemic.
Expertise E-commerce, Amazon, earned wage access, online marketplaces, direct to consumer, unions, labor and employment, supply chain, cybersecurity, privacy, stalkerware, hacking. Credentials
  • 2022 Eddie Award for a single article in consumer technology
See full bio
Laura Hautala
2 min read
security-privacy-hackers-locks-key-6778
James Martin/CNET

In the Equifax breach, hackers stole the driver's license information of more than 10 million Americans, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.

That's in addition to the Social Security numbers and other personal details about 145.5 million Americans hackers took from Equifax's systems. The company said the stolen data included driver's license information, but it didn't say for how many people. What's more, Equifax said Tuesday that 15.2 million records on more than nearly 700,000 UK consumers were also compromised.

Information from a driver's license includes a home address and the driver's height and weight, not to mention the driver's license number. These pieces of data would make a potential identity thief's job easier. The richly detailed consumer records were stolen between May and the end of July this year by hackers who cracked into Equifax's systems by taking advantage of an unpatched software bug, the company said.

Equifax didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on the number of US driver's license records or UK consumer records the hackers stole. The company announced last week that the total number of Americans affected was 145.5 million, not 143 million as it first announced. It also said it was notifying an unspecified number of UK residents by mail that they were affected in some way by the breach.

CNET Magazine: Check out a sampling of the stories you'll find in CNET's newsstand edition, right here.

Life, disrupted: In Europe, millions of refugees are still searching for a safe place to settle. Tech should be part of the solution. But is it? CNET investigates.