After maintaining silence for two months – Staples finally broke their silence and announced that hackers broke into their computers and stole the data on 1.16 million shopper’s credit cards and debit cards. The decision to announce the details of the data breach came as the holiday season comes to a close. Around 115 out of 1400 office supply stores of the company in United States have been affected by this act.
Staples Incorporation is a retail company for office supplies in Northeastern United States. The data breach has affected those who shopped at the small retails of Staples across the nationwide between July 20 and September 16 of this year. The worst over here – criminals are now fully aware of the shopper’s name and card details, including card number, its expiry date and verification code.
The damages for the victimized customers of the company are expected to be minimal as the banks provide them shield from such frauds. Though, Staples has offered its apology to the affected customers along with free identity protection, identity theft insurance and a free credit report.
The apology statement by Staples: “Staples is committed to protecting customer data and… has taken steps to enhance the security of its point-of-sale systems, including the use of new encryption tools.”
But, such statement and security steps by Staples should have been taken before, as for now, it seems to be very late in front of the loss that the victims are about to face. Now, every sensitive detail about the credit cards and debit cards of the victimized customers is in front of the hackers.
In the meantime, Staples is still maintaining silence on why the Company took such a long time in revealing such crucial information.
