Carphone Warehouse has been subjected to a cyber attack that could have seen the personal details of up to 2.4 million customers compromised and the encrypted credit card details of 90,000 customers accessed.
And although most Carphone Warehouse customers will remain unaffected, customers of the OneStopPhoneShop.com, e2save.com and Mobiles.co.uk subsidiaries may have more to worry about.
Customer data
An investigation by Carphone Warehouse found the stolen data may have included names, addresses, dates of birth and bank details and the company says it will be contacting any customers who have been affected by the security breach.
A company spokesman admitted the attack was likely to have taken place “within the last two weeks” and was stopped “straight away” once it discovered on Wednesday afternoon.
Sebastian James, chief executive of Dixons Carphone (Dixons and Carphone Warehouse agreed a £3.8 billion merger in May 2014) said: “We are, of course, informing anyone that may have been affected, and have put in place additional security measures.
He added: “We take the security of customer data extremely seriously, and we are very sorry that people have been affected by this attack on our systems.”
So what should you do if you’re the victim of a cyber attack and you think your details have been compromised?
What to do if you think your details have been compromised
If you think your details have been compromised in this or any other cyber attack, here’s what you need to do…
- Inform your bank and credit card company, so they can monitor activity on your account
- Change your password for your online account
- Check your account for any suspicious or unexpected activity
- Be wary of anyone calling asking for personal information, bank details or passwords
- Check your credit file to make sure no-one has tried to apply for credit in your name – if someone has, you should contact Action Fraud on 0300 123 2040.
