Both Kmart and David Jones – two of Australia’s biggest retailers – were targeted late last week (Oct 1st and 2nd respectively) by third-party attackers which saw personal data of both companies customers stolen.
Both retailers have assured customers that no financial information or passwords were accessed instead sighting customers names, email addresses, phone numbers, delivery and billing addresses were taken.
All affected customers have been contacted by Kmart and David Jones, so if you haven’t received an email from them about this situation you are most likely safe.
“If customers have not received a message from David Jones regarding this situation they have not been impacted,” a spokesperson said.
We advise everyone to keep a lookout for any suspect emails or phone calls from these companies asking for your financial details as neither company does this and it is most likely a phishing scam.
Both companies worked swiftly to ensure that the breach was stimied with Kmart stating that “As soon as [we were] made aware of this breach, immediate action was taken to stop any further information being accessed,” whereas David Jones has stated that “We are reviewing our systems, security measures and working with expert security consultants. Protecting our customers is of paramount importance to us.”
Both companies are working with the federal police to investigate this matter and their websites are now secure again.
But what does this mean for WebSphere, the IBM software that both Kmart and David Jones use as a base for their websites? Could these two breaches in security mean that others using WebSphere are open to attacks too?
If you do use this software on your website we suggest tightening up your security, just to be safe!
Earlier this year WordPress sites were vulnerable to attacks too, so it’s always a good idea to ensure that your software is up to date and that security checks are run regularly!
We can’t stress enough how important this is, for you and your customers. Of course this is mainly to keep everyone’s data safe but from a bit of a different angle having your website hacked and customers targeted can break down the relationship you have with them.
So keeping everything up to date and regularly checked will keep your customers happy as they will be able to trust that your website is safe and therefore that your company is trustworth too.