Posted on June 28, 2018 at 6:13 PM
Ticketmaster Hacked – Over 40,000 Customers Compromised
Ticketmaster, one of the largest ticketing companies in the world, has recently been hacked by an unknown party. According to reports, around 40,000 British users may have their information compromised, and the company has already started notifying affected customers.
Hack on Ticketmaster through Inbenta’s product
A large hacking attack hit Ticketmaster on Saturday, June 23. The company noticed the attack and has alerted its users through its website. According to their report, it is not yet known who is responsible for the attack, however, the company has identified the software used as the property of Inbenta Technologies. Inbenta’s product was disabled as soon as the security team noticed that it was infected by malicious software.
As a result, it is possible that the attackers managed to gain access to information hosted by Ticketmaster International websites. These include Ticketmaster UK, Ticketmaster International, GETMEIN!, as well as TicketWeb. The stolen data includes information like names, email addresses, telephone numbers, home addresses, but also login details for Ticketmaster, and most worryingly, the customers’ payment details.
Australians were likely not affected, claims Ticketmaster
For now, the company is still trying to uncover whether or not Australian users were exposed to the breach. So far, there is no clear indication that any Australian citizen was affected, but the forensic investigation is currently still ongoing, so there is no way to be sure before it concludes.
Despite this uncertainty, the company has still contacted users from Australia and notified them of the incident. As part of their warning, Australian users also received recommendations to change their passwords and to keep a close eye on their credit card statements.
The users that might be affected include those who used Ticketmaster’s services for purchasing tickets between September 2017 and June 2018. Those who are suspected to be victims of the breach will receive free access to a service that provides identity monitoring. Still, the company stated that the attack affected less than 5% of their total customers worldwide.
The company was bound to notify Australian users due to the recent law that was introduced in Australia back in February of this year. According to the law, called Notifiable Data Breach law, all companies that have experienced a breach of security which might affect Australian users are compelled to notify them of the incident.
According to statistics regarding the new law, around 55 breaches were reported in March, after the law was introduced. Before that, in February, the reported breaches numbered only 8 of them.
As for the investigation into this security breach, Ticketmaster has stated that that the firm is cooperating with security experts and forensic teams that are working actively to uncover the details of the hack. Additionally, the company has also turned to all relative authorities, including banks and credit card companies in order to resolve the issue as quickly as possible and to prevent larger damage to the customers.
