Honda Canada hacked, owner information compromised

According to multiple sources, cyber criminals have hacked into the Honda Canada customer database, giving the hackers access to the personal information of over 283,000 Canadian Honda owners.

Among the information stolen by those who hacked into Honda Canada were the names, home addresses, vehicle identification numbers and most importantly, financing information for over 283,000 customers. This information was entered voluntarily by these customers during a promotion in 2009, encouraging owners to sign up for the MyHonda and MyAcura websites.

Honda is quick to point out that while the hackers have acquired some in-depth personal information about Canadian Honda owners, the information stolen is not typical what cyber crooks use for identity theft. According to Honda, information like email addresses, birth dates, and bank account numbers are the types of things hackers need to impersonate you online – but you would have to think that having access to financing information may offer these criminals a better chance of accessing other personal information and/or financial resources.

Honda caught on to this breach in online security earlier this month when there was a sudden increase in traffic on their websites, following by a flurry of unauthorized attempts to access other forms of personal account information.

Even though Honda has worked to assure those 283,000+ Canadian customers that they are safe, if you are among those folks who signed up for the MyHonda or MyAcura websites in the past few years; it is probably a good idea to keep a close eye on your financial statements to ensure that someone else isn’t fooling around with your information.

This is the second time that Honda owners have faced this kind of problem as 2.2 million owners had their information stolen during a similar successful hacking attempt in late 2010. That instance was passed off as one of those “things that happens” but this second batch of unauthorized access to customer information highlights that Honda needs to be putting more effort into the security of their online information.

Source: Autoblog

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