Updated at 7:39 p.m.
The state of West Virginia has filed a lawsuit against Equifax Inc for allegedly disregarding warnings to protect it’s system and postponing informing the public of the massive data breach that impacted about 148 million people in the U.S.
“Equifax’s failure to secure consumers’ personal information constitutes a shocking betrayal of public trust and an egregious violation of West Virginia consumer protection and data privacy laws,” West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey said in a statement Thursday.
The credit card monitoring agency revealed in September that from May to July 2017, “criminals” abused a U.S. website application vulnerability to gain access to certain files. The information collected includes names, Social Security numbers, birthdays, addresses, and driver’s license numbers.
Nearly half of West Virginia’s population was impacted in the breach, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit claims that Equifax did not respond to a minimum of four warnings concerning weaknesses in its framework ahead of the breach. Additionally, the lawsuit claims that Equifax’s chief information officer removed his stock options and sold approximately 6,815 shares of Equifax stock days before announcing the breach.
Equifax declined to provide comment to the Washington Examiner.
The lawsuit, which was filed in Boone County Circuit Court, is seeking $150,000 for every security breach and an additional $5,000 for every violation of West Virginia’s Consumer Credit Protection Act.
