Pizza Hut Australia Website Hackers Gained Access to Customer Information
The famous pizza restaurant chain, Pizza Hut, reported a website-hacking incident where customer's names, email addresses and contact information were leaked. Despite Pizza Hut's claims that the customer's credit card information was not affected, the unpleasant incident should serve as a lesson for the business to keep strict protection of its personal and financial records.
"Pizza Hut can confirm that a layer of its website, pizzahut.com.au, was breached with access gained to names and contact information, including email addresses," Graeme Houston, Pizza Hut General Manager, said in a statement released to technology websites ZDNet and Gizmodo.
Houston did not reveal how many customers' information was leaked and who was responsible for the heinous crime. "We are working with our website providers to conduct a thorough investigation of the matter and have also reported the incident to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner. We would like to reassure all of our customers that absolutely no credit card information was stolen and there is no need for concern regarding credit cards," Houston declared.
Also, Houston guaranteed the customers that the security of Pizza Hut's online ordering system has not been corrupted in any manner. "Our customers can continue to order online in the knowledge the ordering system is secure," Houston further confirmed.
Experts claimed that credit card information should be stored separately at all times. This is a very serious issue since some businesses involved in website hacking made the mistake of combining the two databases.
Over the past couple of years, Australian businesses have already suffered numerous personal information leaks like AAPT, Distribute.IT and Lush. Last year, Sony and Nintendo also suffered embarrassment from a massive data leak. According to experts, it is necessary for businesses to exert time and effort in finding the source of the leak rather than just restoring files or information from a back-up.