Cybercriminals Steal Card Data From Shoney’s Restaurants

Cybercriminals managed to steal payment card data from nearly 40 Shoney’s restaurants after planting malware on their point-of-sale (PoS) systems.

Security blogger Brian Krebs learned from his sources in the financial industry that a fraud pattern had been spotted on cards used at locations of the Nashville, Tennessee-based restaurant chain. Shortly after Krebs published a blog post on Friday, Best American Hospitality Corp. confirmed that some of the Shoney’s corporate affiliated restaurants it manages and operates had been hit by a data breach.

The company hired Kroll Cyber Security to investigate the incident. The security firm determined that hackers had remotely installed malware on payment processing systems at tens of Shoney’s restaurants.

The malware was designed to steal data such as cardholder name, card number, expiration date and internal verification code as it was being routed through the infected device. Investigators determined that in some cases the malware may not have obtained cardholder names.

Kroll’s investigation showed that some of the impacted locations were breached on December 27, 2016, while others were first compromised on January 11. Best American Hospitality is confident that the breach was contained by March 6.

As of last year, there were roughly 150 company-owned and franchised Shoney’s restaurants across 17 U.S. states. Best American Hospitality said the breach affected 37 locations in South Carolina, Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Virginia, Missouri, Florida and Arkansas.

Several other major restaurant chains reported suffering data breaches in the past months, including CiCi’s, Arby’s, Wendy’s and Noodles & Company.

IHG warns of card-stealing malware at front desks

In addition to restaurants, several major hotel chains also reported being hit by card-stealing malware. One of them is InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), which in early February confirmed that systems processing payments for bars and restaurants at 12 of the properties it manages had been compromised.

Now, IHG has informed customers that it has identified malware which may have stolen data from cards used at hotel front desks. The malware is believed to have stolen data between September 29 and December 29, 2016, but the company only received confirmation that the threat had been neutralized in February and March, when the affected properties were investigated.