Another breach by a giant financial institution has leaked the personal information of thousands of customers to the public. reported that an unknown hacker obtained the personal information of 77,009 clients from asset management firm Fidelity Investments.
The information released yesterday revealed that an unknown third party accessed the information in mid-August using two fake customer accounts. It is not yet known how these accounts were used to access customer data. Fidelity said in a letter to its customers that it discovered the breach on August 19. The letter also states that the unknown party did not access the customers’ Fidelity accounts, but after Fidelity completed its investigation, it confirmed that customers’ personal information had been compromised.
yesterday filed a second data breach notification revealing another “data security incident” of Fidelity Investments’ client data. The notice said an unauthorized third party also obtained access to an “internal database containing images of documents belonging to Fidelity customers” by sending fraudulent access requests on August 19. The second data breach did not provide unwanted access to any customer accounts or funds. and that the leaked information only “relates to a small subset of Fidelity’s customers.”
If you believe your information has been accessed by unwanted parties or is part of a data breach, the Federal Trade Commission recommends placing a freeze and fraud alert on your credit reports, personal bank and credit card accounts. You can also report any incidents of identity theft or by calling 1-877-438-4338.
