Trump Hotels Suffer Massive Data Breach, Payments Data Compromised

The latest business to fall victim to a major security breach is Trump Hotel Collection (THC). Executives confirmed that a malware most likely compromised the group’s system “between May 19, 2014, and June 2, 2015”.

“[W]e believe that the malware may have affected payment card data including payment card account number, card expiration date and security code,” said a Trump representative.

Last week, Scottrade, a discount brokerage firm, admitted that its servers were targeted. Experian, a leading credit card agency, was also compromised in the past week. Its database was the highlight of the breach, which included roughly 15 million T-Mobile users and customer profiles.

In THC’s case, the following chains were targeted: Trump SoHo New York; Trump National Doral in Miami; Trump International New York; Trump International Chicago; Trump International Waikiki in Honolulu; Trump International Hotel & Tower Las Vegas; and Trump International Toronto.

Unauthorized software installed in the system may have contributed to the portal that exposed the company’s server. A full-scale investigation is currently underway to find the team of hackers responsible for the breach.

For those who were affected by the unforeseen event, THC is offering a year of identity protection and fraud resolution services.

“Although an independent forensic investigation has not conclusively determined that any particular customer’s payment card information was taken from the properties’ payment card system or misused, we are providing this notice out of an abundance of caution,” mentioned the company in a statement about the event.

Traces of the online attack first surfaced in July from Brian Krebs, a security analyst, who was reporting on the issue. Hilton Hotels was not cited in the report, but the group may have also suffered a similar attack on POS terminals around the same period.