Equifax's cloud rebuild turned its 2017 breach into a growth reset

A criminal attack in 2017 exploited a software vulnerability and stole personally identifiable information of U.S., Canadian and U.K. consumers, forcing Equifax to stop advertising and selling its U.S. consumer business from September 2017 through late 2018.

Under CEO Mark Begor (from April 2018), Equifax made 'transform our technology' the core of its plan: rebuild infrastructure, accelerate migration to a public cloud, and rationalize the application portfolio, while offering consumers free credit-lock services to rebuild trust.

By 2019 total operating revenue was back to growth at $3.51 billion (+2.8%), and Workforce Solutions revenue jumped 15% to $950 million, even as the company absorbed large one-time cybersecurity charges.

Total operating revenue returned to growth, reaching $3,507.6M in 2019 (+2.8%), with Workforce Solutions revenue up 15% to $949.7M as the cloud rebuild proceeded.

The 2017 breach halted U.S. consumer sales for over a year.

Begor's plan rebuilt infrastructure in public cloud and added new products.

Total revenue grew 2.8% in 2019 to $3.51B.

Workforce Solutions revenue rose 15% to $950M in 2019.

After a breach, rebuilding the technology estate in public cloud and shipping new products is what wins customers back — remediation is the cost of entry, not the strategy.

Equifax continued the multi-year cloud transformation and paid out major cybersecurity charges in 2019 while new products, especially workforce verification, drove growth.