Third Party Service Provider Breach Gives Trump Hotel Guests Nightmares

A major data breach of 14 hotels in the Trump Hotel Collection (THC) in the US and abroad is now part of a larger breach of Sabre Corp., a data platform service for hotels around the world. Sabre’s THC data for hotel guest reservations for three hotels was compromised on November 7^th, 2016. For four months prior to its breach announcement, Trump’s DC hotel had guest names, home and email addresses, social security numbers, payment card, and phone numbers stolen. Since then, the data hits have kept on coming for THC and other vulnerable businesses using Sabre and other reservation and payment services.

Most companies find out about data breaches after it’s too late. New hotel data breaches have arguably become a regular posting for THC properties. Three of the Trump hotels in the latest Sabre Corp. breach were also attacked three years ago.

Clients of Sabre can choose to keep or leave their services. What options do consumers have when faced with rampant hack attacks? While you have no control over what happens to your information once it’s provided to a business, you can make efforts to limit fraud attempts against you.

Take advantage of the free annual credit reports at annualcreditreport.com, you are entitled to have each year from each of the three major credit bureaus. If you order one every four months, you can keep better tabs on the information in the reports and remedy it faster, should anything be amiss. If you do see something off-kilter, contact the bureaus to get it resolved right away. Sometimes these reports have incorrect information that is merely a mistake. Other times, it is truly an attempt at fraud. In any case, it should be corrected.

Always pay attention to your payment card charges. If possible, review those charges more often than monthly. If you can only do so monthly, get to it within three days of receiving the statement and report suspicious activity to the issuing institution immediately.

If you are at a payment terminal and have the option to use credit or debit with your card, choose credit. If a thief manages to get access to your information, they won’t be able to get to your PIN, recreate your card, and empty your account of cash.

Guests at THC and other hotel chains like Four Seasons and Loews are blissfully unaware of ongoing attempts to steal their data. Consumers have no idea who’s guarding their personal information. While there are some notification rules and fines that can be applied for non-compliance, most can only hope there are continuing cyber safety efforts that are preventing it from being stolen. They may also hope for prompt notification when hacks occur, allowing them to freeze their credit and/or take other actions to avoid further damage.