LexisNexis Breach Worsened

April 12, 2005

According to the AP, Up to 10 times as many people as originally thought may have had their profiles stolen from a LexisNexis database in the United States, publisher and data broker Reed Elsevier Group PLC said Tuesday.

The company reported last month that criminals may have accessed personal details of 32,000 people via a breach of LexisNexis' recently acquired Seisint unit. It now says that figure is closer to 310,000 people.

Reed said it identified 59 incidents since January 2003 in which unauthorized persons, predominantly using IDs and passwords of legitimate Seisint customers, may have fraudulently acquired personal identifying information on thousands of people

Information accessed included names, addresses, Social Security and driver license numbers, but not credit history, medical records or financial information, the company said.

The company said the 59 identified incidents of fraudulently obtained information - 57 at Seisint and two in other LexisNexis units - are largely related to the misappropriation by third parties of IDs and passwords belonging to legitimate customers. It stressed that neither LexisNexis nor the Seisint technology infrastructure was breached by hackers.

LexisNexis Breach Worsened

Communications and Technology Blog - Tehrani.com

LexisNexis Breach Worsened