No contact information or personal identification numbers have been compromised by the malware, and it “no longer presents a threat”, claims the company.
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The Marriott-Starwood deal also marries two enormous loyalty programs, although gauging the combined size is hard, since the 54 million combined membership in Marriott’s Marriott Rewards and The Ritz-Carlton Rewards overlap with Starwood’s 21 million Starwood Preferred Guest members. “Quickly after we became aware of the possible issue, we took prompt action to determine the facts”.
An online list of hotels involved showed the Sheraton Kansas City Hotel at Crown Center had its “payment card security issue” from March 2 to April 16 this year.
Starwood’s President for the Americas, Sergio Rivera, said that the company has been “working closely with law enforcement authorities and…coordinating our efforts with the payment card organizations”.
On Friday evening, right on the infamous mass-media blind spot, Starwood Hotels announced a data breach that affected 54 of its U.S. properties. Most of the affected hotels are in the United States, including the Westin and W locations in Boston, Los Angeles and NY.
“We want to assure our customers that we have implemented additional security measures to help prevent this type of crime from reoccurring”, he said.
The letter said the chain has arranged for identify protection and credit monitoring services and for a free credit report to be provided to customers who were potentially affected.
The company said the affected point-of-sale systems were at the restaurants, gift shops and other places in the hotels.
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Customers with questions about the data breach can call Starwood at 1-855-270-9179, Monday through Saturday from 8 a.m.to 8 p.m. Central time.
