ADT, the country’s largest home security company in the United States  became aware on April 20th that it had suffered a data breach which, according to Have I Been Pwned, a terrific website that tracks data breaches, resulted in person information of 5.5 million people being compromised.   According to Have I Been Pwned, the sensitive data included email addresses, names, dates of birth, phone numbers, physical addresses and partial government0-issued IDs.  This information can readily lead to identity theft.  ADT also acknowledged that in some instances the last four digits of Social Security numbers were also compromised.  Some people might mistakenly believe that having only the last four digits of their Social Security number in the possession of scammers does not put them in jeopardy.   It most certainly does.  The first three digits of your Social Security number relate to where you live and is easily determined; the second two digits are group numbers that until 2011 were based on when you obtained your Social Security number and are even available on the Social Security website for years up till 2011, but even for numbers issued after that date, there are only 99 possibilities so it is not particularly difficult for an identity thief to determine your Social Security number with just the last four digits.  Armed with your Social Security number, a criminal can make you a victim of costly identity theft quite readily.

ADT had previously suffered data breaches in August and October of 2024.

TIPS

One important lesson is to limit the amount of personal information that you provide to companies and websites whenever possible.  For example, your doctor doesn’t need your Social Security number for his or her records and neither do home security companies.

You should make sure that you have a unique password for each of your online accounts so that if one of your passwords is compromised in a data breach, all of your accounts will not be in danger.  If your information is compromised in a data breach, you should immediately change the password for that account.

If you have not already done so, set up dual factor authentication for each of you accounts where it is available. This will protect you from having those accounts stolen by someone who may have access to your password.  However it should be noted that the malware responsible for this particular data breach is able to bypass password requirements and dual factor authentication.

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