http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/04/countrywide_data_heist/



By Dan Goodin in San Francisco

The Register

4th August 2008



A financial analyst for Countrywide Home Financial, one of the world's 

biggest and most troubled mortgage lenders, has been arrested and 

charged with stealing personal information concerning a breathtaking 

number of the company's customers.



Rene Rebollo, 36, of Pasadena, California, downloaded 20,000 customer 

profiles including names and social security numbers just about every 

week for about two years, according to documents filed in federal court 

in Los Angeles. He would then sell the purloined information for about 

$500 per 20,000 profiles to various buyers. He netted as much as $70,000 

through the scheme, prosecutors alleged.



Although Countrywide had technology in place to disable flash drives on 

employee computers, Rebollo was able to circumvent the safeguard by 

making use of a PC that didn't have it installed. Countrywide is one of 

the biggest providers of subprime mortgages, which offered people with 

bad credit housing loans. In many cases, the loans came with low 

introductory interest rates that would eventually reset to much higher 

rates. Attorneys general from Illinois and California have sued the 

lender for practices that were allegedly unfair and deceptive.



[...]





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Received on Tue Aug 05 2008 - 02:09:33 PDT