Sean Patrick Maloney: “in this age of electronic transactions, we are all highly vulnerable to having our identity stolen and our credit…”

“in this age of electronic transactions, we are all highly vulnerable to having our identity stolen and our credit ruined. Americans deserve every tool available to help protect their identities and their credit. And yet a data protection bill that passed out of the Committee on Financial Services and that is moving to this floor for a vote strips away the ability that consumers in 18 States have to control access to their credit reports at all times. It would allow consumers to freeze their files only after they are victims of identity theft, and that would absolutely do no good. File freeze works because it stops the granting of new credit without the consumers' expressed permission. I urge my colleagues to help protect consumers' credit and identities. I urge them to cosponsor H.R. 5482 and join me in fighting for consumers to have the ability to freeze their own credit information. ____________________”