Michael's Arts and Crafts alerted customers on Saturday that the arts and crafts store may have been a victim of a data-hack which may have taken customer credit card information and pins, Reuters reported.
The store reported an investigation on the possible breach and advised customers to check their financial statements for any type of fraudulent activity, but the company has not confirmed there has been an actual breach, according to Reuters.
"We are concerned there may have been a data security attack on Michaels that may have affected our customers' payment card information," Chief Executive Chuck Rubin said in the statement. "We are taking aggressive action to determine the nature and scope of the issue."
Though Michaels has not confirmed the breach of their system, the company wanted to alert customers to cause awareness after a string of stores have fallen victim to hackers in the past month, Reuters reported. Hackers have breached Michaels network once before.
"We believe it is in the best interest of our customers to alert them to this potential issue so they can take steps to protect themselves," said a statement released by Michaels on Saturday, according to Reuters.
Last month both Target and Neiman Marcus reported a breach of their system resulting in almost 100 million customers credit card information was stolen, Reuters reported.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation warned retailers to be alert for more attacks due to the alarming amount of recent hacks and lack of information on how far they could go, according to Reuters.
The company decided to begin the probe after finding out some of their customers credit cards had been used for fraudulent activity, Reuters reported. They did not reveal how many cards could be affected or when the attack occurred.
U.S. Secret Service spokesman Edwin Donovan told Reuters his agency was investigating the matter.
The last time Michaels was attacked was in 2011 when 94,000 payment card numbers were stolen, according to the Department of Justice, Reuters reported.
"This is devastating for them because this is the second time in a row," Gartner security analyst Avivah Litan told Reuters. "The public and the credit card companies are going to slap their wrist twice as hard because they'll say they haven't learned their lesson and that they can't be trusted."
