Marriott Data Breach

[winger]

Since most MVC owners are affiliated with the hotel side...

After 344 million customers were hit by Marriott data breach, the hotel chain has been ordered to implement better security measures

CHAMBERSBURG- The Federal Trade Commission finalized an order requiring Marriott International, Inc. and its subsidiary Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide LLC to implement a comprehensive information security program to settle charges […]

tristatealert.com

 

[sea&ski]

Well. I had no idea. Anyone else out there aware of this and/or affected by it?

 

[rickandcindy23]

Our credit is frozen, so even if someone had our SS#'s, they couldn't really apply for credit.

 

[Fasttr]

This is just a settlement announcement for old breaches. More detailed info below.

FTC Takes Action Against Marriott and Starwood Over Multiple Data Breaches

The Federal Trade Commission will require Marriott International, Inc.

www.ftc.gov

 

[Dean]

Our credit is frozen, so even if someone had our SS#'s, they couldn't really apply for credit.

Partly, CC companies don't always check credit but being frozen does help.

 

[TolmiePeak]

Our credit is frozen, so even if someone had our SS#'s, they couldn't really apply for credit.

I tried to freeze it but didn't have any success. The credit bureau couldn't verify if it was me when I tried to freeze.

 

[winger]

This is just a settlement announcement for old breaches. More detailed info below.

FTC Takes Action Against Marriott and Starwood Over Multiple Data Breaches

The Federal Trade Commission will require Marriott International, Inc.

www.ftc.gov

The part to force Marriott to do more to secure private information is of importance here "will require Marriott International, Inc. and its subsidiary Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide LLC to implement a robust information security program"

I believe Marriott has been C H E A P in the past with their IT spend and hacks is one fall out. The far from stellar website page is another.

 

[daviator]

The part to force Marriott to do more to secure private information is of importance here "will require Marriott International, Inc. and its subsidiary Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide LLC to implement a robust information security program"

I believe Marriott has been C H E A P in the past with their IT spend and hacks is one fall out. The far from stellar website page is another.

Marriott (the hotel company)'s reservations system is so old that I understand that it (still) runs on mainframe computers and is written in COBOL, a language they were still teaching when I was in college 40 years ago, but which I declined to learn because it was old and becoming obsolete even then. That kind of tells you all you need to know. It must be pretty interesting how they even manage to keep those old systems operating.

MVW still chooses to use Marriott's systems for their own reservations. When they bought Vistana, that came with a much more modern reservations system but MVW dumped the new system and moved Vistana to the creaky old Marriott system.

I'm told that Marriott pays big bucks to geriatric COBOL programmers to keep working and not retire as it's very hard to find younger folks who can maintain their software. At some point that strategy is going to stop working. Maybe the edict from the courts will force them to move out of the 1960s.

 

[dioxide45]

Marriott (the hotel company)'s reservations system is so old that I understand that it (still) runs on mainframe computers and is written in COBOL, a language they were still teaching when I was in college 40 years ago, but which I declined to learn because it was old and becoming obsolete even then. That kind of tells you all you need to know. It must be pretty interesting how they even manage to keep those old systems operating.

MVW still chooses to use Marriott's systems for their own reservations. When they bought Vistana, that came with a much more modern reservations system but MVW dumped the new system and moved Vistana to the creaky old Marriott system.

I'm told that Marriott pays big bucks to geriatric COBOL programmers to keep working and not retire as it's very hard to find younger folks who can maintain their software. At some point that strategy is going to stop working. Maybe the edict from the courts will force them to move out of the 1960s.

The sad reality is, when Marriott bought Starwood with it came a new modern reservation system. Apparently the security behind it wasn't all that great since it seems the breaches impacted Starwood Hotels and at least one of the breaches was prior to Marriott acquiring Starwood.

 

[BrownThunder]

Marriott (the hotel company)'s reservations system is so old that I understand that it (still) runs on mainframe computers and is written in COBOL, a language they were still teaching when I was in college 40 years ago, but which I declined to learn because it was old and becoming obsolete even then. That kind of tells you all you need to know. It must be pretty interesting how they even manage to keep those old systems operating.

MVW still chooses to use Marriott's systems for their own reservations. When they bought Vistana, that came with a much more modern reservations system but MVW dumped the new system and moved Vistana to the creaky old Marriott system.

I'm told that Marriott pays big bucks to geriatric COBOL programmers to keep working and not retire as it's very hard to find younger folks who can maintain their software. At some point that strategy is going to stop working. Maybe the edict from the courts will force them to move out of the 1960s.

That's crazy. I would have figured their codebase ran on C# or C++.

 

[daviator]

That's crazy. I would have figured their codebase ran on C# or C++.

It's completely insane.

https://www.reddit.com/r/marriott/comments/13sr10z

 

[dioxide45]

Reality is, upgrading the system just introduces a whole new host of problems. While is may solve some issues, it isn't like upgrading from mainframe and COBAL is a magic pill that will solve all of their IT woes. Marriott is claiming over 8,000 transactions a second. Amazon probably only does a couple hundred orders every second.

 

[AlmostRetired]

Company data breach is like cancer (sorry for going to a dark place), it is not a matter of who, but when. I fault all companies not just Marriott. They do not respect the information we trusted them with if it costs to protect it.

It would surpass my toes and fingers if I was to count the number of Credit Cards, Healthcare Providers, Verizon, banks, Equifax (ironic) a company called Nation Public Data (I believe over 2 billion records) that I have been notified my information was hacked. The companies that have been hacked are so kind to pay for monitoring services for 2 years. The challenge is SS, date of birth, mothers maiden name never changes and much of the other information infrequently changes.

I pay for monitoring my information using Amex credit secure services and a Costco offering that I pay for. I got so many notices of my information on the "Dark Web" that I sometimes feel a flashlight is shining on my information. I froze my credit with all three credit agencies. All reasonable steps. These are reasonable steps to take to try and prevent identity fraud, unless you were a victim of identity fraud. The ease of someone applying for over 50K of credit cards in 48 hours and given bold enough to call the credit card company to change address to get it shipped elsewhere changed that. I added a password protection to my credit cards requiring a password when calling up the credit card company and speaking to someone. 75% of the time they never ask me. I got tied of complaining. I added password protection when speaking to my bank on the phone or doing any face to face at the bank. Lastly, Fidelity has my 401K. Money can only be withdrawn or information changed at a location. I have done neither so I have no clue if it really works.

 

[pedro47]

When you can breach DOD, in the Pentagon what website is safe.?