INDIANAPOLIS — You can now apply to receive up to $20,000 in cash as a result of Equifax’s global data breach.
Just go to https://www.equifaxbreachsettlement.com/ and click on “File a Claim.”
If you’re not sure whether you qualify for money or credit monitoring, just click on “Find Out If Your Information Was Impacted.”
According to the website, you may be eligible to receive free credit monitoring or up to $125 if you already have credit monitoring.
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“You can receive free, three-bureau credit monitoring at all three national credit reporting agencies (Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion),” read the website. “Experian will provide this service for at least 4 years. You can also enroll in free, single-bureau credit monitoring of your Equifax credit file, provided by Equifax, for up to 6 years after the Experian service ends.”
You can also recoup money if you spent time trying to recover from fraud caused by the data breach, or if you spent time trying to avoid identity theft because of the incident.
For example, if you placed credit freezes or alerts on your accounts, purchased credit monitoring services, you can be compensated $25 per hour for up to 20 hours.
If you claim 10 hours or less, you must describe the actions you took in response to the data breach and the time each action took.
If you claim more than 10 hours total, you must describe the actions you took in response to the data breach and include supporting documents showing fraud, identity theft, or other misuse of your personal information, according to the website.
You may also be eligible for the following cash payments up to $20,000 for:
- the time you spent remedying fraud, identity theft, or other misuse of your personal information caused by the data breach, or purchasing credit monitoring or freezing credit reports, up to 20 total hours at $25 per hour.
- out-of-pocket losses resulting from the data breach.
- up to 25% of the cost of Equifax credit or identity monitoring products you paid for in the year before the data breach announcement.
