In a recent regulatory filing Las Vegas Sands Corp, the parent company of a number of casinos, including the Sands and the Venetian in Las Vegas, as well as a number of other casinos in America and throughout the world disclosed for the first time that the data breach it suffered at its Bethlehem, Pennsylvania hotel and casino on February 10th was more serious than originally thought.  It is now known that the hackers managed to steal not only names and Social Security numbers for employees of the Bethlehem casino, but also names, Social Security numbers and driver’s license numbers for numerous customers of the casino and hotel.  It is not yet known whether or not credit card information for its customers were also compromised.  In  addition, the hackers also obtained passwords for slot machine systems at the casino.  Law enforcement including the FBI are still investigating the hacking, which may have been politically motivated as indicated by comments the hackers made on the hacked website of the Sands.

TIPS

Although Las Vegas Sands Corp is the largest casino company in the world with net income last year of over two billion dollars, it presently appears that the data breach was limited to only the Bethlehem casino.  If you were a customer of the casino and affected by the data breach, the company is offering free credit monitoring services although you may also wish to consider putting a credit freeze on your credit report for greater protection.  You can find more information about credit freezes and how to put one on your credit report by going to the Scamicide archives and looking up “credit freezes.”  If you were a customer of the Bethlehem Sands hotel and casino, you can contact the hotel for further information about the data breach at 866-579-2213.