Getty Former Equifax CEO Richard Smith prepares to testify before the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill October 4 in Washington, DC.
A woman dressed as Rich Uncle Pennybags from the popular board game Monopoly photobombed the former Equifax CEO’s Senate hearing on Wednesday.
Richard Smith was testifying on Capitol Hill in regard to the recent cyberattack on the credit bureau when “Monopoly Man” made an appearance in the crowd over his left shoulder. The unidentified woman wore a white mustache, top hat and a monocle and had a bag of cash tied to her while making several witty expressions during the hearing.
How about Monopoly Man showing up for the Equifax hearings
The Equifax hack led to personal information of about 145.5 million Americans being exposed. On Tuesday, he apologized for the personal data being breached, and said it took weeks for the credit bureau to realize how widespread the hack was.
Public Citizen took credit for “Monopoly Man’s” surprise appearance, saying it sent the character to the hearing to condemn arbitration causes that lead to companies like Equifax taking advantage of consumers. The group said the justice system allows those companies to get away with it and compared doing so to getting a “Get out of jail free” card, like in Monopoly.
“Make no mistake: Arbitration is a rigged game, one that the bank nearly always wins,” Public Citizen arbitration manager Amanda Werner said in a statament. “Shockingly, the average consumer forced to arbitrate with Wells Fargo was ordered to pay the bank nearly $11,000. Bank lobbyists and their allies in Congress are trying to overturn the CFPB’s rule so they can continue to rip off consumers with impunity.”
Man at Equifax breach hearing dressed as the guy from Monopoly.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said that in March, warned Equifax of its online security gap but didn’t do anything to fix it.
“The vulnerability remained in an Equifax web application much longer than it should have,” Smith said at his Tuesday hearing. “I am here today to apologize to the American people myself.”
Equifax has said that an independent review increased the number of those potentially affected by the data breach from 2.5 million to 145.5 million. Smith announced his retirement from the company last week amid scrutiny.
