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HR Departments Tell Equifax Your Entire Salary History
chiguy writes with this snippet From NBC News: "The Equifax credit reporting agency, with the aid of thousands of human resource departments around the country, has assembled...[a database]...containing 190 million employment and salary records covering more than one-third of U.S. adults...[Equifax] says [it] is adding 12 million records annually.' This salary information is for sale: "Its database is so detailed that it contains week-by-week paystub information dating back years for many individuals, as well as ... health care provider, whether someone has dental insurance and if they've ever filed an unemployment claim.""
Privacy and sin,
.2. . .
Like skin on the chin,
Covered by hair,
Nicked by tech #FTW
Burma Shave
This is an important story, beyond the troll.
A political party supporting liberty, where that is defined in part as the right to own all data pertaining to yourself, would see a great deal of support.
And we can expect any of our entrenched parties to support liberty in 3. .
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
How soon can I browse the salary history of CEO's, Congressmen, the chairmen of the FED, the leaders of Scientology, and the lobbyists on capitol hill?
After spending over a year on a mission to get my credit report "fixed", I have a number of anecdotal stories regarding the inherent inaccuracy of the reporting that goes into these databases. My credit reports were not that bad but after a review of the report from the top three agencies, I discovered dozens of factually inaccurate items ranging from wrong addresses to poorly formatted history items. My reports contained input from companies I had never done business with and companies that no longer existed. The problem with this is that if they can't be trusted to confirm the proper spelling of your name, how can they be the "authoritative" source for detailed information regarding your trustworthiness.
Charter Member of The Committee Group For The Elimination And Eradication Of Repetitive Redundancy
Salary information does pertain rather directly to ability to pay off debt.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
I don't think Special Interest Groups would give out that information, and fortunes made through insider trading are equally difficult to quantify.
In our culture, we are afraid of abuses.... legitimately! Having this information for sale can easily be used for such obvious purposes as rejecting a job candidate because their past salary is "too high". Stronger privacy protection is generally considered the antidote to such potential abuses. However, more and more regulation leads to greater and greater bureaucracy and therefore the cost of government increases.
Another solution is a longer-term solution and that is to address the underlying cultural assumptions and shift the world to a more positive outlook based on the idea of the inherent nobility of humans. Our bureaucracy has grown as we have moved away from a perspective on the noble human to the animal human with greed motivating our every move. In fact, this is a cultural choice, not a foregone conclusion.
At some point, I hope that we (culturally) will start responding to these sorts of crisis with a long-term view to improving humanity rather than reacting to the down-side.
Helping with organizational effectiveness is our job.
Just this week, in the paper, I read that one senator is proposing a bill to allow employees to freely and openly discuss their pay. But here we read that this information is simply handed over to credit agencies. These credit agencies can then basically sell your information to Credit Card companies, Banks and more.
So it really begs the question, why am I not allowed to openly discuss my salary information but HR can hand it out to a Credit agency where from there it can be sold to half the corporations in America?
Our government really does not care about it's citizens any longer, only which corporations donate the most to their campaigns. /sigh
Life takes interesting turns, but the most interest is when you're off the beaten path.
The word "corporation" comes to mind.
Welcome to the corporate anarchy, citizen.
Because those same HR groups use the services from Equifax and friends to perform background checks on employees, and new hires.
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
As our political class increasingly becomes an aristocracy, this sort of thing becomes a weapon to keep the peasants out.
Once you're a made member of the club, scrubbing your data and enjoying some privacy is a perq.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
I'm not being conspiracy nut in this. This is just one more tool that HR departments can use to keep pay low for people applying for work at a company. They always ask for what your current salary is. Before an applicant could lie and tell the HR department a higher number and get offered that higher number. Now they can just check this database and see what the number actually is.
When I job switched in the past I've never been offered a number higher than what I currently made when I was truthful about my salary, and I screwed myself over. There was a time when I worked for a start-up and my salary was frozen for four years. When that job died I told my new employer what I was making and got offered a bit less since it was a rough job market. The raises I got at that job were less than inflation. The last time I switched I took my salary at the start of the previous job, ran it through the inflation calculator, added 10% and told that number to the new company. That was the number that I was offered, and they gave me some song and dance about it was a privilege about working in the industry when I tried to see if I could get it higher. So I got a 17% raise over my previous company.
Now with this database that tactic is no longer viable. And if you don't tell them the current number you're making and then check it out, they can mark you as dishonest. Kind of hypocritical if you ask me.
Software Engineer & Writer of Military Science Fiction and Fantasy Blog: petermwright.com Twitter: WrightPeterM
Ted Kasinsky was right.
* Carthago Delenda Est *
If you are a bank considering loaning me money, then I can choose to share my salary information with you. There is no reason at all for this information to be made available without the individual's permission!
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
I just wrote my congressman and senator.... feel free to copy and paste. This is so sick. Wait until the health information exchanges get installed, people will know your health history, social history..... I love the tech age, but this is one aspect of it that I can do without. -M Dear Mr./Mrs. Congressman/Senator: I am writing to request urgent regulation of the following unregulated data collection and resale activity; at minimum grant US citizens the ability to opt-out.... A subsidiary of Equifax named "The Work Number" is gathering and reselling personal salary data.... right down to the paystub. This data can be purchased by just about anyone including debt collectors. This data also includes Uneployment Insurance information, which might dissuade an employer from offering employment to an otherwise qualified individual. Please see this link for information: http://redtape.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/30/16762661-exclusive-your-employer-may-share-your-salary-and-equifax-might-sell-that-data Please act on this soon. I don't feel that my salary information and paystub data should be resold, without my consent. This should be an opt-in program, but they have crept under the regulatory radar. All the best, [YOUR NAME HERE]
The rule of thumb is, how does the proposed law affect a corporate entity that has its hand in the lobbying game.
If it has no affect, it will be ignored and never brought up. It's a waste of time.
If it is detrimental, it will be openly struck down.
If it means money in the pockets of corporate partners, it will sail right through.
This works WAY more often than not. It gets more interesting when more than one special interest in involved. Then there is a fight. The big guy usually wins (look at the oil lobby).
When my identity was stolen (credit card opened in my name by someone with my name/address/SSN/DOB), I froze my credit and my wife's credit. This means that nobody can read our credit files or add to it without our permission. If we want to get a car loan, refinance my mortgage, or open a new credit card, we need to thaw out our credit files. (This costs us $5 per person per agency - of which there are 3 - but this fee varies by state.) If a potential employer wants to run a credit check on me, they'll need to ask for my permission before they can see my credit file.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Insurance makes it expensive. Your insurance is willing to pay up to $500/yr for xrays? Take a wild ass guess at the future price of xrays in a privatize the profits socialize the losses system...
Its the same thing with govt "assistance" for childcare, or "assistance" for tuition, or "assistance" for health care. Another good example is K12 education, where public takes $10K per student but private takes $2K per student to do about the same thing.
If no one had dental insurance, I could probably get a simple cavity filled for $99.95 cash looking at the materials, tools, and education level. But they know they can get $750, so they do. That means uninsured people cannot get any treatment at all unless they're incredibly rich, and insurance ends up being very expensive.
If we ever get "oil change insurance" I guarantee within a year the $20 quickie lube places would be charging at least $200 if not $499.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
I say publish all their other private data. I'm thinking selling the customer list is a good response to them selling my salary history.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Not True. I worked a contract for a health department, and HIPAA violations cover employers, providers, and insurers/agents. However, the key thing is if it would be considered 'protected health information' (PHI). There is alot of data that is not PHI that can legally be shared. PHI really centers on personally identifiable health information. Insurance status generally falls outside of that.
... why demand the secrecy? Why not adopt a Nordic-style openness that shows who pays what taxes and where the taxes actually go. I also appreciated my annual credit history/report that was automatically mailed to my address when I lived in Stockholm. Why do you guys have to make everything so complicated? There's no security through obscurity.
It should be if a considerable number of jobs require it.
Having no food or shelter is not much different than a knife to the neck.
You obviously have never seen a bill for braces. :-) Having said that, my premiums for dental insurance are around $80 a year for my entire family. It covers most routine things at 90-100%. The annoying part is that it costs my employer $1620 for their portion of the bill. Now, if you asked me if I'd like $1700 cash every year, or if I'd like dental insurance, I would decline the dental insurance. Unfortunately, my employer gives a whopping $100 refund if you choose to not get dental insurance. So the way I look at it is, do I pay $180 ($100 refund + $80 premium) for dental insurance, or do I pay for dental out of pocket? Two people getting two cleanings a year would probably cost over that. Add in an X-Ray, and you're way over. Forget about it if you need major work (fillings/crowns/etc). My last job charged $720 a year in premiums and had significantly worse coverage. I declined that coverage.
If the USA ever wants to fix the health care system, part of that will require companies giving people cash in leu of benefits. Between my company and I, my health coverage costs $13,300 a year. That is a ridiculously high amount to pay. I would gladly tweak my plan to make it more economical if it was an option. For instance, I'd take a high deductible plan or a catastrophic plan. My wife was in the hospital for almost two weeks last December. I need insurance for things like that. I don't need insurance to cover a runny nose. If I could tailor a plan to meet my needs, I could potentially save thousands a year. Heck, if I just put my wife on a full plan, and then put myself on a catastrophic plan, I could save tons. How much will my employer pay me if I decline health insurance? $50 a paycheck or $1300 a year. I pay $2000 of the $13,300, so if I dropped my coverage, I'd save $3300 a year. When I did looking, I was able to find pretty good coverage for a lot less than $13,300, but it cost significantly more than $3,300. If my employer would empower me to save money, I would. Especially if I got to pocket it.
Sorry for the rant. The point I'm trying to make is that sometimes people make bad financial decisions because they aren't in control of all of the money being spent. If I have to choose between me spending $50 or my company spending $500, I will take the company spending $500 every time. My money is worth more to me than my companies money is. Having said that, if I could choose to save money for my employer, I would do that to. I had opportunities with my last employer to fly first class to South America. Ticket prices were around $8,000 more to fly first class than to sit in the back of the plane. My company wouldn't have cared. I wouldn't have been punished for doing so. Yet I still chose to sit in the back of the plane, because I wouldn't have been able to sleep knowing that my seat cost $8000 more than it needed to. Now, if my choice was to spend $50 of my own money to sit in the back, or $8,000 of the companies money to sit in the front...that would have been a tough decision.
"Randian Nutbag" would be an awesome superhero name.
Too bad he won't help anybody.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Wanted to mention something very relevant about Equifax. I took advantage of a "get your credit score" free offer several years ago that was posted on Slick Deals. It involved giving Equifax a little data on myself, including an email address that they sent the final credit score report to. I've long used the Spamgourmet forwarding service, so I created and used a unique email address for this purpose. Never gave it to anyone else. It even includes Equifax as part of the name, as well as a "watch word" that was only active for a month when the Equifax account was created. Later I started getting LOTS of spam from Chinese sources to that email address. I don't think it was intercepted, as Equifax hadn't sent me any more mail for quite a while. No one got into my system and none of my other accounts started getting spammed, only the Equifax account.
So, as I see it that leaves three possible causes: Equifax sold my email address to spammers, an employee at Equifax stole data and sold it, or Equifax is so insecure with this very important personal data that they were hacked by the spammers. None of these possibilities speaks well for Equifax.
As of today, 264 pieces of mail have been sent to that account, including the one or two legitimate ones. That particular account was quickly shut down without compromising my read email address, but I've always wondered what information the hackers got on me.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Not relevant. Signing it is a voluntary condition of employment, same as an NDA or similar.
Right - "do this or we'll destroy/limit your livelihood." Totally voluntary, just like being able to afford food and shelter, right?
FYI, it is not a "voluntary condition of employment" if not signing means you lose your job - that's the definition of compulsory. Also, just signing the document does not make it legally binding - you cannot, in fact, force your employees to sign a document that states they must perform fellatio on you on the second Tuesday of every month. Well, OK, you could make them sign it, but that doesn't magically make it a legally binding contract, as the terms of said contract are not legal to begin with.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
You are extremely stupid, I think.
The reason dental cleanings are covered is because otherwise the insured person would not get them and would cost the insurer more. This is a case where relatively cheap preventative care can completely replace very expensive treatment. Not only that but during this cheap preventative care problems can be discovered while they are still minor and much cheaper to fix.
If you were offering insurance that covered all work on cars you would of course cover oil changes, rather than pay for blown motors from lack of them.
The problem in the USA is the absolutely insane marketing. If public information shows that you make a good income and keep your debts under control, you will be bombarded with "pre-approved credit cards", "refinance your home with us", "buy a new car here", "lose all your money in our casino", and other lovely stuff.
If you live in Europe, you have no idea. When I went back to visit the US for several weeks a couple of years ago, I found the incessant marketing just incredible. The bank tellers trying to sign you up for credit cards. Every phone call to a company begins with a recorded sales pitch. Television shows contain more commercials than content, especially the children's shows. It's just incredible. I suppose you must eventually get numb to it...
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
If you RTFA they are given an incentive to provide this information and they even pay Equifax for the privileged! They provide a service for employment history verification. When a potential employer or creditor wants to verify that an individual is actually employed at a company, that company would use this service to handle these verification requests. The HR dept is already overworked and they don't want the liability of a lawsuit in case they accidentally say something negative. To avoid all of this, they just outsource it to Equifax and provide them with all of their HR data; Equifax still retains that data and turns around and sells it.
The funny thing is they tell the HR departments that the information will only be disclosed to the people that you say it can be disclosed to, yet a collections agency could potentially ask for this information to see if it's worth trying to collect or use it as a tool to sue for garnishments.
If enough people raise cane about it, employers will stop using the service. I doubt we can get those jokers to move at all to stop this.
the real unemployment rate in the U.S. is currently 23% (pre-clinton way of counting before BoL changed methodology), that's almost Great Depression levels. the knife is threat of living the life of a bum, a hobo. Quit being a shill for our very evil system
Welcome to the corporate anarchy, citizen.
s/citizen/consumer/g
There, fixed that for you.
Oh, I'm sorry sir, I thought you were referring to me, Mr. Wensleydale.
I agree it is no different than a drug test, which should also not be allowed.
As an employer, I have to say that anybody stupid enough to work for a company that asks for credit information deserves what they get. The same goes for drug testing. If you're willing to sell your credit history and your personal health information for a job, then you're part of the problem.
OK, so when every job that isn't at McDonald's requires one, the other, or both, please explain how we're supposed to financially support ourselves and not be "part of the problem," as you put it.
Moral superiority is easy to feign when you're not the one getting screwed.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
I found this when googling "The Work Number" and ADP.
http://investor.talx.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=74399&p=irol-newsArticle_Print&ID=898835&highlight=
I had bad experiences with credit in my early 20's. Not ashamed to admit it. The more I got to learning about how the credit system works the more I was boggled at how bad it really was and was bound and determined to get out of it by my 30's. So I spent a lot of time in my mid and late 20's with a start up that I eventually sold for a fair amount of money. It wasn't millions, but enough to pay off my debts, buy a condo that I rehabbed and then got luck to flip for a good profit, and then I bought the farm next to my Dad's.
Now I pay cash for everything. If I need a car, I try to find a good used one (although thanks to cash for clunkers there aren't a lot out there. My 2004 Chevy Impala with 130k miles could fetch way more than it's worth at the moment).
After buying the farm, I didn't have enough to buy another place so I decided to rent a loft. Walked in and they all their "credit" requirements. I asked them to figure out the amount of the lease and I'd go right to the bank and get a cashiers check for the full amount up front. Amazing how they no longer needed to run my credit.
Last year I created an LLC for my part time business of going to estate sales and then dealing in antique and vintage furniture. Went to see about credit card processing from the bank and a couple days later got a call back stating that they had a problem: there wasn't any credit records for me. I smiled, said don't worry about it and opened a square account.
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
I followed the link in the article: http://www.theworknumber.com/Employees/DataReport/ It lets you search for your employer. My current employer does not report. My previous employer did, but the one previous to that did not. So that's 1/3 for me. YMMV, but it's probably worth checking. Then you can go (or not) to your HR dept and ask them why or thank them for not divulging your info.
http://www.goarmy.com/
Citizen: Help! Randian Nutbag! My house is on fire!
RN: Contemptible Weakling, if you were strong, I would help you. Or perhaps I would murder you and take everything that makes you strong. That certainly would be an option for a Heroic Spirit. But you are weak and destined for failure.
Citizen: My family is in the house! Oh, save them!
RN: Pusillanimous Conformist Vermin, you have bred hapless, dependent whelps as pathetic as yourself. You are weak and destined for failure. I am indifferent to your suffering. { begins to fly away }
Citizen: W-wh-where are you going?
RN: To collect my welfare cheque. I am *not* indifferent to my own suffering.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
that is false, trivial to "investigate" someone by running background and credit checks. hint, private detectives do it all the time.
credit score is NOT more accurate, it is ONLY based on debt and payment timeliness. of course, that whole industry should have its legs broken, be demolished as horrible invasion of privacy and enslaving people. the banking / finance cartel needs to be put to the flames, most of the recession, war, starving people of resources is a direct result of their machinations
the real unemployment rate in the U.S. is currently 23%
Source: http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/unemployment-charts
Williams recreates a ShadowStats Alternative unemployment rate reflecting methodology that includes the “long-term discouraged workers” that the Bureau of Labor Statistics removed in 1994 under the Clinton administration.
The BLS publishes six levels of unemployment, but only the headline U3 unemployment rate gets the press. The headline number does not count “discouraged” unemployed workers who have not looked for work in the past four weeks because they believe no jobs are available.
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive