On June 22nd I first informed you that Aflac had disclosed two days earlier that it had suffered a data breach that may have compromised sensitive personal information held by the company, which offers a range of insurance products to millions of people. According to Aflac, it noticed suspicious activity on its networks on June 12th and was in the early stages of investigating the extent of the data breach.  Aflac’s press release states that it had not been infected with ransomware, but didn’t yet know the extent of the data breach which may have included include social security numbers and other sensitive information.

Earlier this week Alfac confirmed that it had started notifying approximately 22.65 million people affected by the data breach. Aflac also confirmed that the compromised information included names, birth dates, addresses and most importantly, Social Security numbers of their customers affected by the data breach.

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.  In the past it had focused on the retail sector and now, according to the Google Threat Intelligence Group is targeting the insurance industry.

Eleven separate class actions seeking to represent all of the victims of the Aflac data breach have been filed around the country by individual victims of the data breach. In situations like this the courts generally consolidate the cases into a Multidistrict Litigation Proceeding to decide whether to centralize the cases and what court should hear the case.  As further developments occur in this matter, I will report them to you.

TIPS

Alfac is offering free credit monitoring and identity theft insurance to its customers for two years.  If you are an Aflac customer and wish to get those free benefits, you should call Aflac’s Call Center at 1-855-0305.

Potential victims of this data breach should freeze their credit if they have not already done so.  Freezing your credit is actually something everyone should do.  It is free and easy to do.  In addition, it protects you from someone using your identity to obtain loans or make large purchases even if they have your Social Security number.  If you have not already done so, put a credit freeze on your credit reports at all of the major credit reporting agencies.  Here are links to each of them with instructions about how to get a credit freeze:

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