Sharon Koehler

Artistic Stone Design

Let’s face it, a lot of things happened in 2020, some good, some not so good. Whether good or bad they all had one thing in common: They distracted us and took us away from our normal routines. While we were quarantining, zooming, politicking, civil unresting, home schooling, home working, worrying and eating, unfortunately, hackers were hacking.

Sadly, I cannot list every single data breach that happened last year. Space is too short and the list is way too long,  but what I can do is give you some information on some of the ones that affected the most people.

Ever eat at a Morton’s Steakhouse, a Bubba Gump Shrimp Company or a Boathouse Restaurant (I have)? The parent company is Landry’s, and they own hundreds of fine dining and casual restaurants across the country – not to mention hotels, casinos and other entertainment venues. They had a malware attack at the worst possible place, their point of sale data. What that means is: if you swiped a card, credit or debit, your card number, name, pin number or security info (on the back of the card) was compromised. Google Landry’s to see if you have eaten, ordered take out or pickup at any of their restaurants or stayed at any of their hotels in 2020 or before. Check your statements or accounts to look for anything suspicious. You may, at the very least, have to change your pin and passwords. See   www.landrysinc.com .

Did you ever contact Microsoft with a customer service issue? Maybe something wasn’t working right, or you didn’t understand something, so you gave Microsoft a shout out to help you. Well, Microsoft left over 280 MILLION customer records exposed on an unprotected database. Now, financial records were not at risk, but IP addresses and email addresses were. Do you know what a hacker can do with an IP or email address? These two things are the basis of your online identity. Hacking these two things can leave you wide open to identity theft, phishing, spoofing, and so much more. Change your username, email address and password if you think you were affected. 

I hate to mention the next one because we should all have faith in our pharmacies, but Walgreen’s had a breach in their mobile app, more specifically, in the messaging feature of the app. It not only exposed app messages but names and addresses of users, plus drug names and prescription numbers, as well. They haven’t said how many people are affected but the app itself has been downloaded over 10 million times. This has the potential for insurance fraud by the bad guys, and possibly a lack of medication for you if someone else fills it in your name. If you think this breach involves you or a family member, check with your insurance company to make sure someone out there isn’t filling your prescriptions – and change your password.

This next data breach sends shivers down my spine because of the type of information that was compromised. Carnival Corporations aka Princess Cruises and Holland America Line suffered a breach through someone’s work email. Customer’s names, addresses, SOCIAL SECURITY and PASSPORT information along with financial data was compromised. This one is very scary because everything anyone needs to steal an identity is right there. 

Sticking with the travel theme, Marriott International hotels had a breach that affected over 5 million guests. Names, addresses, email addresses (how was Carnival compromised? Through email) and other personal information was stolen. AND this is their second time. Back in 2018, the information of over 500 million guests was placed at risk. 

If you think the Carnival data breach one is bad, guess what? The one at T-Mobil was just as bad. Again, accessed through e-mail, the compromised information includes customer’s names and addresses plus social security and financial information. To make it worse, they also got phone numbers and plan information. (And you wonder why you get so many spam and robo calls.) Again, everything needed for identity theft was made available to the hackers. 

Are you into social media at all? Facebook got hit to the tune of 267 million profiles. These profiles have been discovered for sale on the dark web. It happens from time to time; your Facebook friends message you and tell you they got another friend request from you. It’s happened to me. I will say that Facebook is good about taking down these fake accounts. Last year a friend of mine messaged me and said he got a second friend request from me. Before I could even do anything, another friend of mine said she also got the same request and reported it. The fake profile was down in less than a day. 

The thing is that this list is just the tip of the iceberg. Nintendo, Home Chef, the U.S. Marshals, Amtrak, Twitter, Ancestry.com, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Barnes & Noble, Pfizer (yes, the drug company) and so many more got hit last year. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that just because you didn’t interact with a company or site last year that you are safe. Companies store data. You could have given your information out in 2019, 2018, 2017 or even before that, and be affected by the 2020 breaches.

I’m not telling you all this to scare you. (Although it should). I’m telling you this to remind you to be VERY careful about your personal information. Check your credit card statements and bank accounts. 

I look at my bank account every day. It’s how I discovered that my debit card was being used by someone other than myself, and I got it shut down before any real damage was done. Report anything abnormal. Use a credit card for online purchases instead of a debit card. Credit cards usually offer fraud protection. Don’t store payment information on sites. Make long and strong passwords with at least 8 characters, combined with numbers and symbols. Don’t reuse passwords or use one password for multiple accounts, and don’t share them with anyone. 

If you want to be extra careful, hire an identity theft service and get a VPN (virtual private network). An identity theft service will monitor your credit information, alert you to suspicious activity or someone opening new accounts in your name, and will help you recover your identity if it is stolen. 

Depending on what you contract for, services usually begin at about $15 per month and go up from there. A VPN can protect your computer’s IP address (every computer has one), and it also protects your internet connections and your privacy, making it more difficult (not impossible, just more difficult) for hackers to gain access to your computer and data. 

Here again, depending on the services you need and the devices you want to cover, VPN services start at about $10 per month and go up from there. 

In this day and age it seems impossible to protect yourself, but if you pay attention, you may be able to stop it before it gets too far and does too much damage. Pay attention, be vigilant, and be careful. 


Please send your thoughts on this article to Sharon Koehler at Sharon@asdrva.rocks.