“Cyber crooks are highly motivated to get their hands on confidential information. This is the new gold,” Cypfer CEO Daniel Tobok told Business News Network (BNN) news anchor Jon Erlichman.
Initially, Hudson’s Bay, the Canadian parent company of Sacks Fifth Avenu and Lord & Taylor, believed about 125,000 Sacks Fifth Avenue and Lord & Taylor customer records were affected. The company later revised that estimate upward, to 5 million records.
“We’re seeing activity on the Dark Web to confirm that 5 million records are up for sale. This makes it one of the largest breaches in retail,” said Tobok.
Other large breaches include: the hacking of Equifax, with 145 million records stolen in 2017; the hacking of Home Depot, with 56 million customer records stolen in 2014; and the hacking of Target, with 40 million customer records stolen in 2013.
Hudson’s Bay was implementing a new online infrastructure when the breach happened.
It is unknown how many Canadian customers are affected by the Sacks Fifth Avenue and Lord & Taylor data breach.
“The best way for consumers to protect themselves is to check their credit card statements every month, to make sure there are no unauthorized transactions. Banks offer apps where you can check your credit card balance every day,” said Tobok.
“Also, be careful of where you do your shopping and banking. Make sure you’re on a secure WiFi. Don’t use public and unsecured WiFi. It’s just not worth it,” said Tobok.
“After a breach, cyber crooks will try to leverage that information to access your own personal information on your computer,” said Tobok.
“Lastly, have complex passwords on all your devices that are not in the dictionary, so in other words, not real words, and not easy to guess either,” said Tobok.
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