Here come the Hannaford lawsuits
As expected, heck maybe even sooner than expected, two lawsuits have been filed against Hannaford Bros. supermarket chain over the huge data breach announced this week.More surely are coming.
First reported by the Boston Globe, one suit was filed in Portland, Maine by Philadelphia law firm Berger & Montague, and a second in Bangor. That suit named Melinda Ryan as the lead plaintiff.
Both actions were taken on behalf of consumers who argue that Hannaford was negligent in its protection of sensitive data -- namely some 4.2 million debit and credit card numbers that were exposed during the card verification process, according to the company.
Hannaford maintains that its systems are among the most secure in the retail industry and that it was in compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).
If that's true, something went wrong. Either Hannaford fell out of compliance, PCI needs some serious rethinking or hackers are just getting that good.
Needless to say, post-TJX, retailers who fall victim to massive data breaches are going to have to do a lot of explaining. And consumers are going to be even more anxious to go after them.
