Mike Futter reports: The US District Court for the Southern District of California has preliminarily approved a settlement over the 2011 PlayStation Network data breach, which took the service down for weeks. The cash value of the settlement could be as much as $17.75 million. The settlement includes an offer of a PS3 or PSP game,…
eBay faces class action suit over data breach
John Ribeiro reports that a potential class action lawsuit has been filed against eBay in the wake of its disclosure of a breach: The consumer privacy class action lawsuit, filed Wednesday by Collin Green, a citizen of the state of Louisiana, alleged that the security breach was the result of eBay’s inadequate security in regard…
European Central Bank receives blackmail letter after hack
The Local reports: The European Central Bank in Frankfurt has received a blackmail letter after its public website was hacked and contact data stolen, the bank said on Thursday. “There has been a breach of the security protecting a database serving (our) public website,” the ECB said in a statement. “This led to the theft…
UK: Online travel services company hit with monetary penalty by ICO following hack
From the Information Commissioner’s Office: Think W3 Limited, an online travel services company, has been served a £150,000 monetary penalty after a serious breach of the Data Protection Act revealed thousands of people’s details to a malicious hacker. The company was hacked in December 2012 after using insecure coding on the website of a subsidiary business, Essential…
OK: Payne County treasurer’s office tosses sensitive documents in dumpster
Paige Hill reports that the Payne County assessor’s office noticed a dumpster full of documents and files with personal information including social security numbers – but before anything could be done, a dump truck hauled all the papers away. County Assessor James Cowan says he noticed documents that date from the 1980′s to 2008. Read more on…
Board OKs pact to protect U. Maryland security breach victims
Michael Dresser reports: The state Board of Public Works approved a contract worth an estimated $2.6 million Wednesday for a firm to monitor the credit activity of an estimated 300,000 people whose personal information was exposed as a result of a computer security breach discovered at the University of Maryland early this year. The board…