The criminals behind the hack made their way into the user database through the company’s Learning Lodge app store, wherein games, books, music and other educational content for VTech toys can be downloaded.
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Find help for common financial problems in our Solutions Center! “Personal information, however, like a child’s name, birthday, and home mailing address can be used by clever and patient cyber-criminals to compromise personal information over time using highly-targeted phishing attacks that leverage the initially stolen information”.
The company has vowed to stop the same thing from happening again in the future, saying: “We are committed to protecting our customer information and their privacy, to ensure against any such incidents in the future”.
The hack impacted worldwide users of VTech’s app store, Learning Lodge, which has been temporarily shut down while an investigation is ongoing. It did not break out the number of children’s’ profiles affected.
Security expert Graham Cluley warns that the breach underlines the need for parents to think seriously about how their childrens’ data is shared.
The hacker claiming responsibility for the breach told Motherboard he or she had no plans to do anything with the data. VTech has previously said that the app store database was attacked by hackers on November 14, though the company became aware of the breach more than a week later.
The company’s statement said the children’s profiles included only name, gender and birth date.
According to Hunt, the passwords on VTech’s database didn’t have sufficient protection. The company said it had reached out to every account holder in its database.
Electronic toy manufacturer VTech confirmed on Friday a data breach which has affected almost 5 million of its customers.
However, VTech insists no customer bank details were stolen. The hack reportedly includes data from nearly five million accounts.
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On Monday, attorney generals for both CT and IL separately said that they will be investigating the breach, but did not clarify if they were cooperating with other states, according to a Reuters report.
