Easyjet was hacked: 9 million customer data are affected

The cheap airline easyJet was hacked. Picture: EPA

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Easyjet has been hacked: data from 9 million customers is affected

A major cyber attack on easyJet caused access to the personal data of 9 million customers. Some customers are also concerned with credit card details.

The British airline easyJet has become the target of a hacker attack. The company announced Tuesday that email addresses and travel dates were being accessed and said all affected customers would be contacted.

Of the 9 million people affected, 2,208 credit card details were stolen, easyJet said in a statement to the stock exchange.

Customers whose credit card details have been stolen have already been contacted, while all other affected parties will be contacted by May 26 at the latest. According to the BBC broadcaster, Easyjet noticed the first signs of an attack in January. So far, there was no information on who might be behind the attack.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has recommended easyJet to address everyone because of the increased risk of phishing scams.

EasyJet said: “There is no evidence that personal information of any kind has been misused.” Those who do not receive a message are also not affected by the incident, the message continues.

It is not yet clear whether Swiss customers are affected.

Happy buses possible

The hacker attack could inflict a heavy fine on the airline, which, like everyone, is suffering from the slump in air traffic due to the corona pandemic.

Competitor British Airways is still fighting a fine of the equivalent of a good 200 million euros after the theft of hundreds of thousands of credit card data in 2018, which the competent authority ICO had imposed. At the recommendation of the ICO, Easyjet asked customers to be particularly vigilant, especially with regard to emails.

In the past few years there had been repeated hacker attacks with hundreds of millions of people affected. The record is held by the Internet company Yahoo, where unknown attackers gained access to data from all three billion user accounts in 2013. It was about names, email addresses, telephone numbers and defaced passwords.

Chinese suspected

In 2018, attackers at the world’s largest hotel group, Marriott, captured data from up to 383 million guest entries due to a security vulnerability at the subsidiary Starwood. These included more than five million unencrypted passport numbers.

US authorities suspect Chinese hackers behind the attack and point out that such data could be of interest to intelligence agencies, among other things. On Ebay, hackers came across an attack on data from around 145 million customers, including e-mail and home addresses and login information, which became known in May 2014. (awp / sda / dpa / reu)