Cathay data breach lasted for months
Cathay Pacific has admitted that its recent data breach was much worse than it initially revealed and it was in fact a sustained attack on its system for more than three months.
Internal and external IT security teams fought to contain the cyberattack from March until May, it said.
Its security firewalls were repeatedly breached by ‘sophisticated hackers’, despite the airline spending HK$1 billion in three years on IT infrastructure and security.
The company made the admission in a written submission to Hong Kong government officials ahead of a committee hearing this week to discuss the matter.
The airline had been roundly criticised for keeping quiet for so long about the data breach and the latest admission, contradicting earlier statements, has angered lawmakers.
Lawmaker Charles Mok said: “March, May, August they missed all these opportunities to report it. The answers are very vague… they didn’t elaborate.”