Allianz Life Data Breach Affects 1.1 Million Customers
In July, Allianz Life, a leading U.S. insurance provider, experienced a data breach that allowed hackers to access the personal information of 1.1 million customers, according to the data breach notification platform Have I Been Pwned.
The company publicly acknowledged the breach in late July, confirming that the personal information of the “majority” of its 1.4 million customers and employees had been compromised from a cloud-based customer relationship database. Allianz has not disclosed the specific number of individuals affected.
As reported by Have I Been Pwned, the Allianz Life breach involved personal data such as customers’ names, genders, birth dates, email and home addresses, as well as phone numbers, all extracted from a database managed by the cloud service provider Salesforce.
Allianz Life also informed officials in Texas and Massachusetts that the hackers acquired Social Security numbers during the breach.
Brett Weinberg, a spokesperson for Allianz Life, declined to comment to TechCrunch, stating that the company is still in the process of investigating the incident.
Allianz Life is among a number of tech and corporate giants that have recently faced data breaches, attributed to a hacking group called ShinyHunters, known for employing social engineering tactics to trick employees into granting access to company databases.
Other organizations, including Google, Cisco, airline giant Qantas, retailer Pandora, and HR firm Workday, have also recently reported data breaches tied to their Salesforce-managed data, as noted by TechCrunch on Monday.
The ShinyHunters group is believed to be creating a data leak site to pressure victims into paying for the deletion of their stolen data, a tactic commonly utilized by ransomware groups. This collective reportedly collaborates with other hacking and criminal organizations, such as Scattered Spider and The Com, a notorious group known for hacking, extortion, and sometimes threats of violence to penetrate networks.
