Marriott Hotels - Millions Hacked Again

For the second time in less than two years, Marriott says it’s been hacked. Personal information for “up to approximately 5.2 million guests” was compromised this time around, the hotel giant announced at the beginning of April. A year and a half ago in November 2018 the Marriott hotel chain was hacked with theft of 500 million reservation data records.

Now Marriott has been hit again with around 5.2million guests possibly data hacked. This attack does not seem as bad as the 2018 hack but, Marriott should have really improved its data security and some are saying this means other hotels must check their cyber security.

Marriott first became aware that they'd been hacked when a security tool flagged an unusual database query. “We identified that an unexpected amount of guest information may have been accessed using the login credentials of two employees at a franchise property.” Following this discovery, the management ordered that the login credentials were disabled ande began an investigation and additional actions for improved security.

Marriott has not explained why it took a month before it alerting its customers about the hack. 

It is understood that the current intrusion dates from January 202, when someone used the security information of two franchise property employees to access an "unexpected amount of guest information." Those data points included contact details like names, email and home addresses, and phone numbers, as well as gender, birthday, frequent flier numbers, loyalty account info, and hotel preferences, like whether you like being near or far from the elevator.

Marriott is hardly the first company to get hacked multiple times, even at this scale. Yahoo, with hacks of 500 million and 3 billion users is the highest known of to date.

Stealing the hotel’s guest data, is often associated with cyber criminals aiming to use identity theft, or make use of stolen credit card numbers. The hotel chain says that credit card data, PINs, passport and driver’s licence information was not accessed by the hackers, whose identities are so far unknown. Following the 2018breach it was reported that hackers were thought to be  employees of the Chinese intelligence services.

In July of 2019 British Information Commissioner's Office levied a fine of £99 million for violating British citizens' privacy rights under the GDPR. 

Marriott says beware of scammers who might try to take advantage of this attack and the hotel chain says it will never call or email guests asking for “payment card information, other financial account information, online account information, or passwords.”

NCSC:     Marriott:     Wired:        CSO Online:      FastCompany:       Register:    

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