30 Jul Seagate Covers $5.75 Million for Accidentally Compromising Employees’ Data
News last Friday reports that data storage giant Seagate is paying $5.75 million over a lawsuit involving staff that mistakenly sent a trove of employee data in 2016 via phishing email.
The settlement will wipe out allegations that Seagate violated regulations under the California competition laws, and was criminally irresponsible leading to the events of the data breach. The coverage includes insurance for damages that resulted from identity theft.
Following the data breach in 2016, many attackers took advantage of the compromised data by filing fake joint tax returns using worker’s social security numbers.
Six employees were severely affected by the incident, which led them to file a case on behalf of all the other workers who faced identity theft issues.
The agreement will also cover expenses employees paid for cleaning their names in the registry due to fraudulent federal tax returns.
Source: The Register