By Joseph Slacian
jslacian@thepaperofwabash.com
Wendy’s in Peru and Warsaw were among the more than 1,000 restaurants that may have had credit card information hacked.
Company officials released the locations of 1,025 restaurants that were “potentially affected” by the hack. There are more than 6,500 Wendy’s across the United States. The hacking involved restaurants in all 50 states and Washington, D.C.
The Wabash Wendy’s was not included on the list. That, according to the company website, means that restaurant “has not been identified as affected by our forensic investigation.”
“We sincerely apologize to anyone who has been inconvenienced as a result of these highly sophisticated criminal cyberattacks,” Wendy’s President and CEO Todd Penegor said in a release issued July 7. “We have conducted a rigorous investigation to understand what has happened and we are committed to protecting our customers and keeping you informed.”
The company had already announced it discovered a hack in February. The stolen data includes cardholder name, credit or debit card number and expiration date. The company says it doesn’t know how many customers had their data compromised in the hack, which started sometime in the late fall of 2015.
Wendy’s is offering to provide credit monitoring services and other protections to customers for up to a year.
“In May, we confirmed that we had found evidence of malware being installed on some restaurants’ point-of-sale systems, and had worked with our investigator to disable it,” Penegor said. “That malware has also been disabled in all franchisee restaurants where it has been discovered. We believe that both criminal cyberattacks resulted from service providers’ remote access credentials being compromised, allowing access – and the ability to deploy malware – to some franchisees’ point-of-sale systems.”
He recommended that customers “remain vigilant for incidents of fraud and identity theft” by reviewing credit card account statements and monitoring credit reports for unauthorized activity.”
Customers with questions or who would like more information should call 866-779-0485 from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. CST Monday through Friday, excluding major holidays.
“In a world where malicious cyberattacks have unfortunately become all too common for merchants, we are committed to doing what is necessary to protect our customers,” Penegor said. “We will continue to work diligently with our investigative team to apply what we have learned from these incidents and to further strengthen our data security measures.”