Farmers Insurance customers should be taking steps to lock down their personal data after the company disclosed that over a million people were hit in a data breach earlier this year. Bleeping Computer reports that an advisory on the Farmers Insurance website states that on May 30th, a third-party vendor alerted them to suspicious activity including unauthorized access involving one of the vendor's databases.
The breach, which occurred the previous day, exposed customer information including names, addresses, birthdates, driver’s license numbers, and/or the last four digits of Social Security numbers. The third-party vendor had monitoring tools in place that quickly detected the unauthorized activity and were able to take quick containment measures to block unauthorized access. Farmers, after learning about the incident, immediately launched an investigation to determine the nature and scope of the breach and it also notified law enforcement.
