Acer just confirmed that Desorden, a group of hackers, had attacked its servers. The hackers were able to access data worth over 60 gigabytes, which contained sensitive information about millions Acers customers.
The compromised information includes names, addresses and phone numbers for several million clients as well as restricted financial data.
Hackers first reported the hack and Acer later confirmed it to be true. Desorden managed to hack Acers servers in India and gain massive amounts of data. This data includes both corporate and consumer accounts. Desorden says that the number of affected customer accounts is in the millions.
The hacker group released over 10,000 customer accounts as proof of the data breach. Potential buyers are interested in the remaining data, which will now be for sale. The hackers aren't clear if they want to sell the data underground or if they just want Acer to pay ransom.
Acer claims that the company immediately implemented security measures and ran a scan of all its systems. Acers after-sales support system in India was affected by the attack. Acers has now begun notifying any customers potentially affected. Acer stated that the incident would not have any impact on its business continuity in a statement to Privacy Affairs. This is probably true. However, it is unfortunate timing for Acer as it is the second major data breach that it has suffered in the past year.
The hacking group REvil attacked Acers' servers earlier this year. All sensitive data, including bank accounts and bank communications, was stolen.
REvil demanded $50 Million in XMR (a cryptocurrency), as a ransom to recover the stolen data. Acer has not commented beyond admitting that there were abnormal circumstances during the attacks. This ransom demand was the largest ever recorded.
Acer has had a very successful year, despite the hacking incidents. Acer recently began selling laptops pre-installed with Windows 11 and was one of the first to do so. Acer Nitro XV2 is the company's newest gaming monitor.
A data breach can be devastating enough. But, to have two in the same year is an absolute disaster for Acer. It is even worse for customers. Companies of Acers caliber are frequently under attack. It appears that at least two of these attacks were successful in 2021. This is a clear indication that Acer might need to tighten its security measures.
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