Data breach
Experian South Africa data breach
In 2020, Experian South Africa suffered a data breach affecting 1,525,385 records. Exposed data included names, surname, identity number and 5 other types of data.
Breach date
1.5 million
Records in the breach
8
Types of data exposed
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Data exposed in the Experian South Africa breach
- Names
- Surname
- Identity Number
- Email addresses
- Phone numbers
- Addresses
- Financial Information
- Employment Information
About the breach
The Experian South Africa Data Incident in August 2020 exposed personal information belonging to approximately 24.05 million individual consumers and 790,000 business entities.
What Happened
• Cause: A fraudster posed as a legitimate client and tricked Experian into handing over consumer and business data intended for marketing and lead generation.
• No Hacking: Experian's core database and technical infrastructure were not hacked; rather, data was handed over via a fraudulent request.
• Exposed Data:
• Names, surnames, South African ID numbers, contact numbers, email/physical addresses, and employment details.
• No core banking passwords, credit card numbers, or primary financial/banking login credentials were part of the breach.
• Action Taken: Experian obtained a court-sanctioned Anton Piller order to seize and delete the suspect's hardware and files, and reported the matter to law enforcement (the Hawks) and the Information Regulator.
What Happened
• Cause: A fraudster posed as a legitimate client and tricked Experian into handing over consumer and business data intended for marketing and lead generation.
• No Hacking: Experian's core database and technical infrastructure were not hacked; rather, data was handed over via a fraudulent request.
• Exposed Data:
• Names, surnames, South African ID numbers, contact numbers, email/physical addresses, and employment details.
• No core banking passwords, credit card numbers, or primary financial/banking login credentials were part of the breach.
• Action Taken: Experian obtained a court-sanctioned Anton Piller order to seize and delete the suspect's hardware and files, and reported the matter to law enforcement (the Hawks) and the Information Regulator.
How to protect yourself
In order to start protecting yourself from possible fraud in future, we highly recommend the following steps:
1. Monitor your credit reports for possible suspicious activities. If you cannot do this yourself, we recommend you sign up with online services that does this on your behalf.
2. Be on the lookout for an increase in spam or fraudulent calls. We recommend you make use of mobile apps like True Caller, which can assist you in identifying potential spam or fraudulent calls.
3. Monitor your banking transactions. Ensure that you are receiving notifications of transactions by either SMS, your app or email.
1. Monitor your credit reports for possible suspicious activities. If you cannot do this yourself, we recommend you sign up with online services that does this on your behalf.
2. Be on the lookout for an increase in spam or fraudulent calls. We recommend you make use of mobile apps like True Caller, which can assist you in identifying potential spam or fraudulent calls.
3. Monitor your banking transactions. Ensure that you are receiving notifications of transactions by either SMS, your app or email.
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