In First Cyber Insider Trading Case, SEC Charges Former Equifax Chief Information Officer

In the first ever insider trading case stemming from a cybersecurity attack, the SEC filed civil charges against the former Chief Information Officer of Equifax's United States Information Systems business unit for trading on material nonpublic information.

According to the SEC complaint, Jun Ying was among a select few in the company entrusted with information from which he deduced that Equifax had been the victim of a catastrophic data breach. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Ying allegedly exercised all of his vested options to buy Equifax shares, and then immediately sold those shares for total proceeds of more than $950,000. Several days later, Equifax publicly disclosed the breach, resulting in a same-day drop of nearly 14% in the firm's share value. In selling his shares prior to the public disclosure, Mr. Ying avoided more than $117,000 in losses that he would have suffered had he not sold until after news of the breach became public. Mr. Ying, who had recently