Hyatt Hotels Issues Update on Credit Card Security Breach at its Properties

Restaurant at Hyatt Union Square

Hyatt Hotels announced the results of its investigation into a security breach of its computers used for processing payments at its hotels and resorts.

In December, the hotelier said it had discovered malware on those computers.

The investigation found that there had been “unauthorized access” to credit card data for credit cards used in person at multiple Hyatt-managed locations in the period August 13, 2015 through December 8, 2015. Most of the information accessed was from credit cards used at restaurants although some were used at spas, golf shops, and parking facilities as well as in a small number of cases a hotel’s front desk or sales office.

Credit cards presented starting July 30, 2015 are at risk.

Hyatt said that the malware collected the credit card number, expiration date, internal verification code, and cardholder name and that there was “no indication” that other customer data was collected.

The issue affected credit cards used at hundreds of Hyatt hotels in over 50 countries. In the United States this includes hotels in some 25 states including the five largest states by population in the country, California, Texas, Florida, New York, and Illinois.

The hotel chain said in a statement that it has since worked to “strengthen the security of our systems in order to help prevent this from happening in the future.”

“Protecting customer information is critically important to Hyatt, and we take the security of customer data very seriously,” said the hotelier’s global president of operations, Chuck Floyd.

(Photo: Accura Media Group)