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Downeast Energy Suffers Security Breach

Posted on September 15, 2009 by Dissent

Downeast Energy in Brunswick [Maine] says that the company is the victim of a computer breach that led to unauthorized access to one of its bank accounts at Key Bank. The personal information of as many as 800 Downeast customers may have compromised as well.

Downeast says the perpetrators succeeded in transferring funds out of the account, which may result in a loss of around $150,000 to the company.

Read more on Fox23.

Update: Downeast Energy issued this statement on their site:

Downeast Energy has recently discovered that it was the victim of a computer breach resulting in unauthorized access to one of its bank accounts at Key Bank. The perpetrators succeeded in transferring funds out of the account which may result in a loss to Downeast less than $150,000. Downeast Energy employs multiple, sophisticated, information technology security systems to protect its information resources. This breach occurred as a result of a response to a very sophisticated phishing e-mail.

“This is an unfortunate incident and we apologize for any inconvenience to our customers,” said John Peters, President of Downeast Energy. “We are continuing to work closely with law enforcement and our bank to ensure that our account is secured but more importantly to protect our customers as well.”

Downeast Energy understands the scope of this crime involves many other companies, banks and the geographic reach of the crime extends well beyond Maine and has international roots.

The perpetrators were able to transfer money from the company’s bank account which receives the automatic deposits from customers EFT accounts (Electronic Funds Transfer). Because this particular bank account was hit, the perpetrators could have viewed certain private information of Downeast’s EFT accounts customers, their names, their banks and their account numbers at those banks.

Maine law, Chapter 210-B of Title 10, requires that in these circumstances the company must give notice to customers of such breach. Also as a part of our notice requirements under Maine law, we notified the Attorney General’s Office of this event.

The company has sent letters to all the customers, approximately 800, affected by this incident and plans to follow up with phone calls to each customer to extend its apologies and ensure the customers understand the situation.

Category: Breach IncidentsBusiness SectorU.S.

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