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Pentagon Credit Union Database Compromised

Posted by samzenpus on from the leaking-like-a-sieve dept.

Trailrunner7 writes "The credit union used by members of the US armed forces and their families has admitted that a laptop infected with malware.was used to access a database containing the personal and financial information of customers. The Pentagon Federal Credit Union (PenFed) issued a statement to the New Hampshire Attorney General that said data, including the names, addresses, Social Security Numbers and PenFed banking and credit card account information of its members were accessed by the infected PC."

2 of 108 comments (clear)

  1. I still find it crazy that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I still find it crazy that systems like these don't have dedicated computers for accessing that info. Personally, I *refuse* to enter ANY kind of password into most peoples laptops, let alone access sensitive information belonging to thousands of people. Then again, no one cares about "other peoples information" until that other person is you...

  2. Re:What should I do? by v1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    usually their first recommendation is to put a watch on your credit score, a lot of the time when a bank has a breech they offer to pay for a year or so of this service to all their members whose information may have been exposed, so you can call them and see what they are offering for safeties after the fact.

    Change your pin and password, security question, etc for this account immediately. If you have a pin or other password etc used on that account that you use in other places, you should change those other places also, as they may try to use the credentials on other accounts they can figure our are yours in other places.

    Also while you're talking with this credit union, see what they can do to adjust the 'paranoia level' on your account. That's what gets you a phonecall from them when you go on a vacation and buy a bunch of stuff and suddenly the card is getting declined. You want high paranoia on their part for awhile. There may be ways to set reasonable hard limits on charges per day etc a bit like how you can usually only pull $250 cash a day from an ATM. Set those limits temporarily as tight as you feel you can. They may have other options, ask them.

    And of course the ever-popular "consider changing banks". Do you really trust them as much with your money as you did before?

    --
    I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.