We are a bunch of tech geeks, coders and designers. TJ Maxx Not Really Helping Consumers »
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That’s my opinion after reading the details of the proposed TJX lawsuit settlement. You can read the details here for yourself – but be warned – do not attempt to operate heavy machinery while reading this document because all the lawyer jargon will surely put you to sleep.
Here are a few of my issues with their proposed settlement:
- TJX has agreed to compensate consumers for any time they lost “as a result of the intrusion,” but those calculations will assume a rate of $10 per hour. I don’t know how they came up with that figure, but victims that make more than $10 per hour and had to take time off of work to handle one of the many steps involved when one is a victim of identity theft are not really being compensated fairly. Lame.
- The compensation also seems to be limited to $60 and will be in the form of $30 vouchers for making purchases at TJX only. Further, if a lot of consumers agree and “the total of such claims exceeds $7 million, the dollar amount of each voucher will be proportionately reduced.” I do not shop at TJ Maxx. What good is a $30 voucher from a store at which I do not shop?Furthermore, what if my total time amounted to 7 hours? Seven hours x $10 an hour is $70 and yet the compensation is limited to $60. Super-lame.
In addition, even if I did shop at TJ Maxx and decided to use the measly $30 voucher, in all likelyhood I would probably spend more than $30 during my shopping trip. So, TJ Maxx is the real winner there.
Lastly, what is the real value of a $30 TJ Maxx voucher? You can bet it is not $30. The store is probably out of pocket about $5 for each of those vouchers.
Evan Schuman had a great take on the settlement:
Let me see if I understand this correctly: Due to apparently recklessly weak security procedures, consumers that you invited into your stores had their credit card information and identities taken, all because they chose to buy your merchandise. How to make amends? Invite them back to bring their new credit cards and buy more stuff.
He even had a great idea for some radio commercials that TJ Maxx may want to consider:
“Come to the ‘We Ripped You Off and Got Away With It Special Celebration,’ with 25 percent off all jeans and 30 percent off if you use a credit card. Make sure to bring two forms of ID, though. Just kidding. You no longer have an identity.”
Cracked me up…
Anyway, I think this is a weak attempt by TJ Maxx to make this all go away. There are too many unanswered questions about this entire event. And U.S. District Court Judge William Young thinks so too because he told attorneys in a hearing in Boston Sept. 27 that he “had a lot of questions and concerns” about the settlement. Why is there not an option in the settlement that allows a victim to opt for cash instead of a voucher?
Until “big business” is held more responsible when they mismanage consumer’s sensitive data, these types of things will continue to happen and we will probably continue to place implicit trust in these retailers as we blindly hand over our personal information when we make purchases in their stores.
TJ Maxx Data Thief Irving Escobar Sentenced »
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Irving Escobar, one of the main parties responsible for the T.J. Maxx database theft, has been sentenced to 5 years in prison and has to pay about $600,000 in restitution.
This is the latest news in the T.J. Maxx Identity theft fiasco, where more than 45 million personal records of their customers were stolen over an 18 month period, records which included customer names, credit card numbers, addresses, etc. I don’t shop at T.J. Maxx because my wife’s information was among those stolen and T.J. Maxx did not notify her or alert her or anything – not even an apology. But enough about me, back to Escobar’s story.
In March, Irving Escobar pleaded guilty to participating in an organized scheme to defraud and four others involved also pleaded guilty. A few others were arrested and have since been sentenced to probation: Dianelly Hernandez, Julio Alberti, Reinier Alvarez and Zenia Llorente. Escobar’s mother, Nair Alvarez, was deported to Venezuela after she pleaded guilty in March – hahaha, that is funny.
Authorities estimated a total loss of $3 million could be attributed to Escobar and his co-defendants on a nationwide scale. The unfortunate things, in my opinion, are 1) taxpayers now have to pay for these morons to live in prison, 2) with good behavior, they will probably not have to server their complete sentence and 3) identity theft victims in these cases will spend more time than that trying to clear up their credit.
Here is a post we did on what you should do if you suspect identity theft.
Popular Blog Topics »
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Most of our blog traffic comes from Google and other Search Engines but, oddly enough, the “Search” function on our blog gets quite a workout. So, I decided to post some of the most popular searches and maybe you will see something that grabs your attention.
For example, topics related to good passwords are always popular. Autocad is another hot topic for the blog. We also get tons of traffic from readers looking to secure a wireless network. Also, the series of posts I did on the TJ Maxx database hack and resulting loss of their customers credit card information has been wildly popular (my wife, who had her information stolen as a result of this event, still has not heard from TJ Maxx).
Identity theft and what to do if you think you may be a victim is another popular topic. I compiled a 4 part series of posts that tackled that issue.
One last example, a post we did on professional web design received a lot of traffic and even resulted in a few new web design clients 
.
Thanks to all our readers and “happy searching” .
Most Computer Attacks From US »
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Symantec released its Internet Security Threat report last month and it contained some very interesting information with regarding the state of Internet security. Why should home computer users in the United States using Internet Explorer as their web browser pay particular attention?
TJ Maxx Latest News »
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Today, I read a very interesting article by Evan Schuman of eWeek regarding the TJ Maxx data theft. The title of it made me pause: “The Nightmare Scenario: What if TJX Did Everything Right?”. I admit, I had thought of that previously but dismissed it since TJX was being rather tight-lipped about the incident. To me, that silence meant they must have been negligent in some way. And, since my wife’s data was stolen in the TJX database hack, that sealed my opinion. However, as I said, the title of that article caused me to reflect, what IF TJ Maxx did everything right?
