Information from 750,000 Japan Airlines Flyers May Be Compromised

Authorities are investigating the data theft, which has affected as many as 750,000 frequent flyers.

Frequent flyers of Japan Airlines are watching their identities and their mileage balances much closer. The Japan Times reports as many as 750,000 members of their frequent flyer club, Mileage Bank, may have had their identities compromised.

According to Japan Today, the company announced the data breach during a press conference on Thursday. The security breach came in the form of a virus that came through e-mail, infecting 23 computers at the company. Of those infected, seven were able to access the frequent flyer data and sent it forward to a server in Hong Kong. The Japan Times reports that the breach could have begun as early as August 18 and was only detected by airline officials this week.

The data obtained by the virus includes names, addresses, genders, birthdays and employment information of Mileage Bank members. Officials at the airline told Japan Today that no credit card information or mileage balances were stolen during the data breach.

This is the second time in the past year that Japan Airlines has experienced problems with their frequent flyer program. The Japan Times reports that the Japanese flag carrier prematurely shut down a program in February that allowed travelers to exchange miles for purchases at Amazon.com, after hackers exploited the service and cost the airline thousands of dollars. Japan Airlines has not yet relaunched the service, and announced postponement of the program’s second launch as a result of this most recent incident.

Officials at the airline do not believe that the two incidents this year are related. The data breach has been reported to Tokyo Police for further investigation.

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