Michaels and Aarons Stores Security Breach
Michaels Stores Inc. reported Thursday, April 17th that approximately 2.6 million Debit and Credit Cards may have been affected by a security breach.
There are also indications that Michaels its subsidiary, Aaron Brothers was also attacked, with approximately 400,000 cards potentially being affected.
Michaels claims that it has contained the incident, which actually began sometime in 2013. has received "limited" reports of fraud from banks and the payment card brands that are potentially connected to the breach.
The compromised data includes customer information such as payment card numbers and expiration dates. Currently, Michaels has indicated that there’s no evidence of any other information such as names, addresses or PIN numbers were at risk.
The details come nearly three months after Michaels disclosed that it may have been a victim of a data breach and that it was working with law enforcement authorities, banks and payment processors.
The company indicated that both chains were attacked by criminals using highly sophisticated malware that had not been encountered previously by any of the security firms that were conducting the investigation.
The breach at Michaels stores occurred between May 8, 2013 and January 27, 2014. The breach at the Aaron Brothers stores occurred between June 26, 2013 and Feb. 27, 2014. A total of 54 Aaron Brothers stores were affected by this malware.
Michaels has indicated that is is offering free identity protection, credit monitoring and fraud assistance services for 12 months to any affected any Michaels and Aaron Brothers customers in the U.S.
Company representatives did not indicate why it too so long to inform it’s customers of the breaches.
– John