In a recent admission to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Live Nation Entertainment, the parent company of Ticketmaster, communicated its ongoing investigation into a dramatic data leakage. The hacking syndicate known as ShinyHunters have publicised that they have stolen data from over half a billion Ticketmaster patrons, propelling the company into scrutinising this matter swiftly.
ShinyHuntes have established themselves as a potentially formidable threat since their inception in 2020, according to popular belief. Brett Callow, a cyber threat expert at Emsisoft, labels them a plausible threat generator, even though more information about this collective remains scarce. Their primary objective of obtaining personal records to sell them aligns with their previous dealings with companies such as Microsoft and AT&T, both victims of ShinyHunters’ incursions. Significantly, it prompted federal investigators to take note of this group.
AT&T validated the existence of a data breach affecting about 70 million former and existing patrons in a press release in March. Similarly, the US Department of Justice made public that a member of ShinyHunters, Sebastien Raoult, a French national aged 22, pleaded guilty to planning wire fraud and aggravated ID theft. The court awarded him three years of incarceration and a fine of over $5 million as reparations.
The data breach led a forum, BreachForums, to post about it on May 28th. The hackers endangered the credibility of the identities of 560 million Ticketmaster customers, threatening to expose their credit card details and ticket purchases for an asking price of $500,000. The data, amounting to close to 1.3 terabytes in size, is enormous. The imprecise timing of the breach, however, remains a mystery.
Ticketmaster alerted regulatory authorities and affected clients following the detection of the unauthorised activity on May 20th. The company also announced its cooperative stance with law enforcement to alleviate risks for the company and its customers.
Both the FBI and Ticketmaster chose not to offer a statement in response to inquiries made on Friday. Despite a reported data breach, Live Nation assures that there will be no significant interference with their business performance, financial status, or operation outcomes.
If you are among those who use Ticketmaster’s services, it’s advisable for you to alter your password – even though, according to Mr Callow, there’s currently no indication that any customer passwords were accessed.
This event adds to the ongoing issues that Ticketmaster has been facing. The government, claiming that an illegally upheld monopoly over the live entertainment industry is in place, prompted the Justice Department to commence a lawsuit against Live Nation on 23rd May, demanding the company be dissolved. The allegations have been dismissed by the company as groundless. This information was initially reported by The New York Times.
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