

The companies also deceived customers by providing “Remove” and “Flag as Inaccurate” buttons that did not work as advertised, according to the complaint. All the while, the companies touted the accuracy of their reports in online ads and other promotional materials, claiming that their reports contain “the MOST ACCURATE information available to the public.” The FTC says, however, that all the information used in their background reports is obtained from third parties that expressly disclaim that the information is accurate and that Truth Finder and Instant Checkmate take no steps to verify the accuracy of the information. In a complaint, the FTC says Instant Checkmate and TruthFinder made millions from their monthly subscriptions using push notifications and marketing emails that claimed that the subject of a background report had a criminal or arrest record, when the record was merely a traffic ticket. In 2014, Instant Checkmate agreed to settle FTC charges that the company previously violated the FCRA by failing to take reasonable steps to make sure that its background reports were accurate and that its users had a permissible reason to have them.
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“And, if you market your reports to be used to screen tenants or employees, you are a consumer reporting agency and you must follow the requirements of the FCRA.”Ĭalifornia-based Instant Checkmate and TruthFinder market people-search services, allowing users to search unlimited background reports on individuals, and charge monthly subscription fees to view the full reports. “Companies that compile personal information and sell background reports are on notice: Don’t make false claims about the contents of your reports,” said Samuel Levine, Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection. SeptemThe Federal Trade Commission will require background report providers TruthFinder and Instant Checkmate to pay $5.8 million to settle charges that they deceived consumers about whether consumers had criminal records and that the companies violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) by operating as consumer reporting agencies while, among other things, failing to ensure the maximum possible accuracy of their consumer reports.

However, the company has ascertained that the incident was an accidental leak or that hackers stole a particular list however, there is no evidence of a network breach.Under proposed order, companies will pay $5.8 million penalty, implement FCRA monitoring program The investigation is still underway, and PeopleConnect has collaborated with a third-party cybersecurity firm to find more details regarding the incident. The published list originated inside our company.” What Could Have Happened? “We have confirmed that the list was created several years ago and appears to include all customer accounts created between 20.
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“We learned recently that a list, including name, email, telephone number in some instances, as well as securely encrypted passwords and expired and inactive password reset tokens, of TruthFinder subscribers, was being discussed and made available in an online forum.” The company has published notices on both impacted websites ( 1) ( 2), confirming the data breach. PeopleConnect has confirmed the incident and assured that an investigation has been launched. Screenshot: PeopleConnect Confirms Breach: The following screenshot shows leaked files and the information that has been leaked in the Instant Checkmate and TruthFinder data breach. Upon extraction, the entire dataset turned out to be a whopping 7 GB, including the following information: These leaked records were stored before the backup was created on April 16th, 2019, and were shared as two 2.9 GB CSV files. On January 21, 2023, unidentified hackers leaked a 2019 backup database belonging to TruthFinder and Instant Checkmate on Breach Forums, a hacker and cybercrime forum that surfaced as an alternative to the popular and now-seized Raidforums.

This website collects detailed information from many sources, such as criminal records, address histories, marriage and divorces, bankruptcies, and more. Instant Checkmate is an online tool that provides users with access to public records. TruthFinder can be used for a variety of purposes, including background checks, address searches, reverse phone number lookups, court records searches, and more. It provides access to public records and other data sources to provide accurate and up-to-date results. TruthFinder is an online service that enables users to search for information about people, businesses, and even phone numbers. Instant Checkmate and TruthFinder data leak – Screenshot:
