Mercedes-Benz reports data breach of 1.6 million customers

Mercedes-Benz data breach
Written by Emma Davis

The American division of Mercedes-Benz has reported a data breach affecting some of the company’s customers.

The incident affected 1.6 million records, which included customer names, addresses, email, phone numbers and some information about the vehicles purchased.

The incident reportedly occurred on June 11, 2021 due to unsecured cloud storage. According to the company, the leak affects some customers and potential car buyers who, between January 1, 2014 and June 19, 2017, entered confidential information on the websites of the company and dealers of Mercedes-Benz.

The investigation of the incident is still ongoing, but it is already known that among the leaked data there were such important things as:

  • customer credit ratings (people reported them themselves);
  • driver’s license numbers;
  • social security numbers;
  • credit card numbers;
  • date of birth.

The company emphasizes that this information was not available for search and was not indexed in search engines: β€œto view the information, you had to know special programs and tools. An Internet search did not find the information contained in these files.

No Mercedes-Benz system was compromised as a result of this incident, and at this time, we have no evidence that any Mercedes-Benz files were maliciously misused. Our vendor confirmed that the issue is corrected and that such an event cannot be replicated. We will continue our investigation to ensure that this situation is properly addressed.Mercedes-Benz USA claims.

Although the leak affects 1.6 million records in total, according to Mercedes-Benz, only about 1,000 customers reported “additional” personal information that was available in the said cloud storage.

The company says that personal information about these individuals (less than 1,000) consists primarily of self-reported credit scores, as well as a very small number of driver’s license numbers, social security numbers, credit card information, and birth dates.

All victims are now reporting the incident, and the company has already notified the power leak. It is reported that the victims of the incident will be offered two years of free credit monitoring.

Let me remind you that Volkswagen reports data breach affecting over 3.3 million Audi owners, as well as, as it turned out later, Audi and Volkswagen customer data put on sale.

Sending
User Review
0 (0 votes)
Comments Rating 0 (0 reviews)

About the author

Emma Davis

I'm writer and content manager (a short time ago completed a bachelor degree in Marketing from the Gustavus Adolphus College). For now, I have a deep drive to study cyber security.

Leave a Reply

Sending