Faizel Patel – 20/08/2020
The South African Banking Risk Centre (SABRIC) says they are aware that a suspected fraudster had in possession the personal data of 24 million South Africans and almost 800,000 businesses.
The data breach has caused panic across the country.
The world’s biggest credit data firm, Experian says the information was handed over to an individual who fraudulently represented a client.
The firm has admitted that the data was handed over to the fraudster in May and only recovered the hardware where it had been stored three months later.
Sabric’s CEO Nischal Mewalall says while the exposed records are staggering South Africans and business must not panic.
“Experian has already told us that they have taken steps in order to seize this information that seemed to be in the possession of the fraudster. What that means is that it seems like the risk has been contained and this will further be confirmed in the days ahead.”
Mewalall says while many banks have also been affected, they have been coordinating with the institutions to enhance its own security measures.
“They have already proactively taken some steps to protest the profiles of these customers and certainly many of us already have received SMS’ from our banks telling us about the data breach and we need to take steps to protect our profiles.”
Mewalall says he believes that the data stolen by the fraudster was destined for resale and would possibly advertised on the dark web allowing criminals to pick up the data using it commit fraud, open bank accounts and other criminal activities.
Listen to the interview with Nischal Mewalall
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