The Latitude Financial hack has taken another turn for the worse, with sensitive banking and financial details belonging to New Zealand customers now in the hands of criminals.
The breach from March has already exposed 1,037,000 New Zealand driver licence numbers, along with details from 34,000 passports.
However, with further analysis, Latitude Financial has now confirmed that sensitive banking information has been exposed too.
Approximately 90,000 customers in New Zealand have had their personal banking numbers as well as income and expense information used to assess loan applications exposed.
This data is extremely sensitive in the wrong hands. Privacy law barrister Kathryn Dalziel said those affected have grounds for a formal complaint with the Privacy Commissioner.
“Each individual person needs to think about the impact this has on them,” she said.
“Even worse, they can see what you’ve been spending your money on, that would be enough for individuals to feel humiliated.”
She said this information is sensitive, especially when it involves people applying for loans.
Dalziel said the update from Latitude Financial represents a “really serious” and “significant” update.
A spokesperson for Latitude Financial said no passwords were stolen, and these new details are a “sub-set of the previous numbers we’ve disclosed.”
“Latitude is contacting all individuals affected by the cyber-attack to explain what information has been compromised and the support we are providing them,” they said.
“We encourage all our customers to remain vigilant and alert to the risk of scams.”
According to the Privacy Commissioner's office, this is New Zealand's biggest known data breach.
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