The latest Uber data breach affected 57 million driver and rider accounts.
The popular ride sharing company Uber is the latest victim of increasing cyber-security threats. The Uber data breach reportedly occurred in 2016, being concealed for a year without the public knowing. This alone is reason for concern, since the company appears to have made an attempt at not letting the sensitive information out. Multiple reports are claiming that Uber tried to payoff the “hackers” in the amount of $100,000 dollars, in return for destroying the compromised data. However, it is unknown if the hackers did actually destroy the data as promised.
WHO is at risk?
According to the official report on Uber.com, experts say that there was no leak of trip location history, bank or credit accounts numbers, dates of birth or Social Security numbers. This seems to be the only good news to come out of this particular data breach. There was, however, a significant amount of other information that was stolen as part of the Uber data breach.
- Some personal information of 57 million Uber users, not only in the U.S., but around the world. The information leaked includes names, email address, and cellular phone numbers. This applies to both riders and drivers.
- Approximately 600,000 drivers in the United States only, had their names and driver’s license numbers compromised.
- Uber has posted a support webpage for drivers as well as a support webpage for riders.
WHAT should you do?
Based on the information that we know, Uber says that riders do not need to take any action. They claim that the Uber data breach did not result in any evidence of fraud or misuse, tied to the incident. They will, of course, be monitoring for any irregular activity on affected accounts and will flag them for fraud protection if needed.
ID Protection Deals advises that you do, however, take some action since a riders personal email address and phone number could be at risk. It is possible that they could receive phishing attacks, or fraudulent phone calls asking for additional personal information. Be cautious of opening emails that appear to be out of the ordinary, or again, asking for personal information. In addition, always remember to never click links inside your email as well.
HOW did the Uber data breach happen?
Like many small and large companies, Uber uses cloud-based services to handle their business and application processes. Uber claims that two people, who did not work for the company, were able to access the data inside the cloud service that Uber uses. Forensic experts were also hired to investigate the Uber data breach. These experts came to the conclusion that no critical personal information was in the hands of the attackers. That said, yet another data breach goes to show how important it is to protect our personal information.
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