Mark Hawthorne of The Brisbane Times reports:
A security breach has allowed confidential Westpac shareholder information to be included in an official document published on the Australian Securities Exchange website.
A document Westpac released to the ASX in March contains the security holder reference numbers (SRN) and holder identification numbers (HIN) of up to 20 accounts controlled by the global investment bank JPMorgan and a retired 65-year-old shareholder, Peter Liddle, who resides in the Northern Territory.
[…]
The addresses and account details of JPMorgan Nominees and Mr Liddle are hidden in white type in the PDF document, which was issued by the Westpac company secretary, Anna Sandham, on March 13.
The details cannot be read – but if the words are copied into another document, such as an email, they can be converted into black type.
Several business websites, such as wotnews.com.au, converted the information, and in doing so published the details on the internet.