SEATTLE – Another day, another data breach notification. Live Nation, the parent company of Ticketmaster, confirmed that this latest cyber attack involves hundreds of millions of people.
The company said it discovered unauthorized activity within a third-party cloud database on May 20, and its staff immediately began an investigation. Ticketmaster account holders are now receiving notices of the breach. So what’s next?
This latest cyber attack is huge as seven out of 10 live event tickets sold go through Ticketmaster, according to the Attorney General.
“We last used Ticketmaster in March when we wanted to go see Toby Mack,” Stacy Bolin said.
“Well, I have one coming up on Idina Menzel at Paramount,” Dan Navarro said.
“Oh yeah, it was last year it was for Taylor Swift, for the Eras tour,” said Lydia Dahlgren.
Instead of ticket alerts, hundreds of millions of Ticketmaster customers are being alerted to this new cyberattack.
“Well, all of our information can be put out there for anyone,” Bolin said. “Typically, bad actors are after data, personal data, personal information and they’re looking for sensitive information, your password, your payment information such as credit cards, your financial information, which maybe they can use it to make money because most of this information is quite valuable in the underground economy,” Kaustubh Medhe, VP of research and threat intelligence at Cyble Inc., told KOMO News.
“All of our information can be put out there for anyone,” Bolin said. That means it’s time to change passwords for Ticketmaster and all credit card-related accounts.
In the attack on Ticketmaster, the hackers, dubbed “ShinyHunters” are believed to have offered the stolen data to the highest bidder on the dark web.
“It’s widespread now,” Michael Bruemmer, with Experian, told KOMO News. He said an average of three data breach alerts were sent to every adult in the US last year, so everyone has received at least one notification.
“So you can assume that a lot of the time that your data is either exfiltrated and maybe put on the dark web — it can be left in the hands of hackers to do social engineering as well,” Bruemmer said. This data includes names, emails, phone numbers, addresses and credit card numbers.
SEE ALSO | Live Nation says the Ticketmaster data breach exposed the information of millions of customers
Live Nation sent notices to customers and said it is working to mitigate the risk and is cooperating with law enforcement. But what should customers do while the investigation is underway to figure out what exactly was stolen?
Dahlgren told KOMO News that she is a flight attendant, so she set up fraud alerts on her accounts because she is in many different cities.
“I’m always checking every notice to make sure I bought this in California. I was in New York today making sure it wasn’t just something else I didn’t do,” Dahlgren said. One of these alerts were given in time to stop any real damage to its accounts.
“I had something on my Amazon account a few months ago. I mean, I give my record to my family members, but it was a movie rental and no one had rented that movie,” Dahlgren said.
She told KOMO News that she immediately changed her password.
“And it disputed the charge and it all came back, but yes, it was someone who had logged into my account and was renting a movie,” Dahlgren said.
“I usually look for the dollar test, and then if you get a bunch after that, then you know you’ve been hacked,” said Ben Bolin. Small changes like this are how criminals start testing the card to see if someone marks it, and if that works, they increase the amount they try to charge on a stolen card.
Signing up for fraud alerts is just one of four things Bruemmer suggests to keep accounts safe from cybercriminals. He also suggests signing up for free credit monitoring, never reusing a password and using a password vault, which he said suggests long passwords and keeps track of them for you.
“Because we’ve seen it over and over again with our health plan being hacked and your information being there, and then the prescription plan being hacked and then the eye plan being hacked, and so you just, you just have to be aware,” said Ben. KOMO News.
Another tip Bruemmer shared with KOMO News to avoid hackers is to never use public Wi-Fi. Especially now, he said, during the busy travel season.
“Members should be concerned about misuse of their email IDs, mainly attackers tend to use many of these stolen email ideas to launch phishing campaigns, send emails to these members and try to extract more sensitive information about them, such as passwords or ask them. to make fictitious payments to an account that is under the control of an attacker,” Medhe added.
Medhe also told KOMO News that it’s important to use good quality antivirus software on systems and never click on links or download software without making sure you know the true source. These are the ways bad actors spoof your personal data.
Ticketmaster’s breach of customer data comes on top of another controversy the company is dealing with.
The Justice Department and dozens of state attorneys general filed a lawsuit to break up Ticketmaster, on behalf of music fans and artists, accusing the company of creating a monopoly in the live entertainment market.
SEE ALSO | DOJ says illegal monopoly by Ticketmaster and Live Nation raises prices for fans
“As detailed in our complaint, Live Nation stifles its competition using a variety of tactics,” said US Attorney General Merrick Garland.
The lawsuit lists several tactics, including:
- Pressuring artists to use her promotion services
- Retaliating against countries that work with rivals
- Closing concert venues to exclusive ticket contracts
Live Nation’s public review began in 2022 on ticket sales for Taylor Swift’s Eras tour.
Dahlgren said Ticketmaster’s site crashed when Era’s tour ticket sales went live.
“So I spent 12 hours on the computer just trying to get tickets for that show. Thankfully, I didn’t have any problems, but I’ve seen online how people have had problems with scammers,” Dahlgren said. Dahlgren said many of the stories she heard came from Swift’s super fans.
“I’m not that committed. I went to the verified fan site and they didn’t, and so it’s like yeah, they couldn’t get tickets just because they weren’t randomly selected. And then there were still scrappers out there selling tickets,” Dahlgren said.
“I looked at the resale sites to see if they would drop the prices closer to the show, but Ticketmaster was also out and you couldn’t resell on Ticketmaster, so everyone goes to other sites and puts them at 23 times the price. It’s not fun,” Dahlgren told KOMO News.
“What the DOJ is seeking, first and foremost, is structural relief, a reorganization of Live Nation and Ticketmaster so that they can stop what they say are anti-competitive and monopoly-like practices,” the lawyer said. Brian Buckmire.
Live Nation denied the allegations and said other factors are problems, such as rising “production costs,” “the popularity of artists” and “online ticketing.”
If this case is not dismissed and goes to trial, it could drag on for years, with legal experts expecting months of arguments in court.