I have been writing a lot recently about data breaches which is not really surprising since last year alone there were 9,478 publicly disclosed data breaches exposing over more than 35.9 billion records globally and 2025 appears to be on its way to a record number of data breaches.  Data breaches are an unfortunate fact of life for all of us and can readily lead to identity theft and other harm.

The most recent data breach involve Australian airline Qantas which recently disclosed that it had suffered a data breach through a third-party platrform it uses for customer service.  According to a press release released by Qantas on July 2nd, the hackers obtained access to personal information of six million of its customers. The compromised personal information included names, email addresses, phone numbers, birth dates and frequent flier numbers.  It did not include credit card information.

It is believed that this data breach was the work of the infamous hacking group called Scattered Spider which focuses its efforts on one specific industry at a time, often using ransomware.  The FBI has recently issued a warning that Scattered Spider was going to be targeting airlines and since the time of that warning, Hawaiian Airlines and WestJet along with Qantas have all been successfully hacked.  It would not be surprising to see more airline data breaches in the days ahead.

TIPS

Be wary of anyone who calls you purporting to help you in regard to the data breach who asks for personal information in regard to this data breach as that is a favorite tactic of hackers to lure you into providing additional personal information that can lead to your becoming a victim of identity theft.  Already there are reports of the hackers, posing as Qantas employees, calling the victims of the data breach using the phone numbers they obtained in the data breach asking for information that would lead to identity theft. Also, as always, never click on a link or download an attachment to an email or text message unless you have absolutely confirmed that it is legitimate and don’t provide personal information in response to an email, text message or phone call unless you have absolutely confirmed that the communication was legitimate.

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