Fashion retailer Guess last week confirmed that the personal data of some customers was compromised in a ransomware attack it suffered in February 2021.
In a filing with the Maine Attorney General’s Office last week, the company said it fell victim to a ransomware attack in February this year, and an investigation it launched into the incident has revealed that some user data was accessed by the hackers.
The incident, Guess says, was discovered on February 19. In addition to attempting to encrypt files on the organization’s systems and disrupt its operations, the adversaries were able to access “certain Guess systems between February 2, 2021 and February 23, 2021.”
According to Guess, it was only in late May that it discovered that the adversary indeed accessed users’ personal information, including “Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, passport numbers and/or financial account numbers.”
In the data breach notification filing, Guess revealed that a total of 1,304 individuals are believed to have been affected in the incident, including four Maine residents. The company started notifying the affected users on July 9.
The fashion retailer also says that it has implemented additional measures to improve its network security and mitigate the risks of similar incidents occurring in the future.
DataBreaches.net reported that the attack on Guess was launched by the DarkSide group, which also targeted Colonial Pipeline earlier this year. DarkSide apparently shut down operations following the attack on Colonial Pipeline, but before doing so, they claimed to have stolen 200 Gb of files from the fashion retailer.
“We notified law enforcement and are cooperating with their investigation. We also implemented additional measures to enhance our security protocols. We regret that this occurred and apologize for any inconvenience,” the company says in the notification letter to the affected individuals.
The American clothing brand and retailer also makes accessories, such as bags, jewelry, perfumes, and watches. The company has more than 1,000 retail stores in the Americas, Europe and Asia, and, as of January 2021, also operated 524 additional retail stores worldwide.
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