A former Equifax executive has been charged by the SEC with insider trading. The exec allegedly sold his company stock before announcing last year’s massive data breach the company experienced.
According to the SEC, Jun Ying, the CIO of an Equifax business unit and the next in line to become the global CIO, apparently received confidential information about the company’s breach before the news was made public. He allegedly sold his shares, making close to $1 million and avoided a $117,000 loss when the company’s stock price tanked after the breach news was made public.
Ying is also facing criminal charges from the US Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia, SEC said. “Corporate insiders who learn inside information, including information about material cyber intrusions, cannot betray shareholders for their own financial benefit,” Richard R. Best, director of the SEC’s Atlanta office, said in a statement announcing the charges against Ying.
