DATA BREACHES IN AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND AFFECT 14 MILLION

Mon 27 March 2023:

Around 14 million customers of the consumer lender Latitude Financial from Australia and New Zealand had their personal information stolen, the business announced on Monday.

Despite the fact that the attack was only recently made public, a “forensic review” revealed a much higher number of people had been impacted than initially thought—the equivalent of nearly half the populations of the two countries put together.

“We recognise that today’s announcement will be a distressing development for many of our customers and we apologise unreservedly,” the company said.

It found that the details of 7.9 million Australian and New Zealand driver’s licences had been stolen, as well as 53,000 passport numbers.

Another 6.1 million records dating back to at least 2005 with information such as names, addresses, telephone numbers and dates of birth were also hacked.

The combined population of Australia and New Zealand is 31 million.

Latitude initially thought that only 330,000 customers’ personal information had been compromised.

“It is hugely disappointing that such a significant number of additional customers and applicants have been affected by this incident. We apologise unreservedly,” Latitude Financial chief executive Ahmed Fahour said.

“We continue to work around the clock to safely restore our operations. We are rectifying platforms impacted in the attack and have implemented additional security monitoring as we return to operations in the coming days.”

Latitude Financial stated that the Australian federal police were investigating and that it was working with government cyber-security experts as well as its own advisers.

Customers who chose to replace their documents would be reimbursed, according to the company. Since March 16, no suspicious activity had been detected on its systems, according to the company.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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