A massive security breach affected as many as 34, 500 Acer customers when hackers broke into the computer maker's online store and stole highly sensitive customer information. In a letter sent to California's Attorney General (AG), the Taiwanese tech company revealed that the hacked data includes information such as names, addresses, and credit card numbers with their expiry dates and 3-digit CVC security codes.
The company notified its customers of the situation in a letter saying, "We recently identified a security issue involving the information of certain customers who used our ecommerce site between May 12, 2015 and April 28, 2016, which resulted in unauthorized access by a third party."
The latest data breach is very problematic as the stolen information such as the names, addresses, credit card numbers, expiry dates, and CVC security codes are exactly the kind of information hackers need in committing wide-scale credit card fraud.
The unauthorized access reportedly affected customers based in the US, Canada, and Puerto Rico. Acer further noted in their letter that no Social Security number were stolen since the company doesn't collect them and there is no proof suggesting that log-in credentials like usernames and passwords were affected. The company also advised customers to report to the authorities any suspicious or fraudulent activities on the credit card account and exercise vigilance by checking their credit reports.
The company is taking immediate steps to resolve the security issue by closely cooperating with federal authorities and cybersecurity experts. Acer has also notified their credit card payment processor regarding the incident to prevent the unauthorized use of the stolen credit card information, Techno Buffalo reported.
This isn't the first time that "mega breaches" have been reported. Even social media companies like MySpace, LinkedIn, and Tumblr all suffered the same fate after hackers leaked millions of their users' account information. Just recently, Canadian media organization VerticalScope also reported a massive security breach that affected more than 1, 100 of its forums resulting to nearly 45 million leaked users' data, ZDNET reported.
