ID theft -- bank finds a way to profit

Security-challenged Wells Fargo offers credit monitoring at a high price

Federal regulators say Wells Fargo jeopardized the personal information of hundreds of thousands of customers through a string of security breaches over the past two years. Wells in turn has found a way to profit from the problem.

The San Francisco bank, in conjunction with marketing behemoth Trilegiant, is offering a new service called Wells Fargo Select Identity Theft Protection. For $12.99 a month, this includes daily monitoring of one's credit files and assistance in dealing with cases of fraud.

Wells is encouraging people to enroll in the service by providing the first 30 days free. If you don't call to cancel during that period -- (877) 816-8243 -- the bank will begin automatically billing your credit card every month.

"It's a classic case of turning lemons into lemonade," said Beth Givens, director of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, a San Diego consumer advocacy group.

"Turning their security woes into a profit center is highly questionable, " she added. "They should be giving this away for free."

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/07/22/MNGHADS1TL1.DTL&type=tech

One might conclude that the security breaches were a good thing for the bank. Hmmmm.

Charging you to protect information that they were entrusted with to protect in the first place.
They should have to do this shit for free.
But who is gonna make them?:shrug:
Too bad there can't be class action lawsuits against these fucking predators.
Of course that isn't by accident either.
Seems like all the security breaches happened AFTER that option was taken off the table.