Wyndham Settles FTC Data Breach Charges
10 December 2015 - 4:50AM
Dow Jones News
Wyndham Worldwide Corp. will establish a comprehensive
information-security program to protect cardholder data to settle
Federal Trade Commission charges that Wyndham's security practices
unfairly exposed information of hundreds of thousands of consumers
to hackers in three separate data breaches, according to the
FTC.
Wyndham said Wednesday it was glad to reach the settlement—which
also requires the hotels and resorts chain to conduct annual
information-security audits and maintain safeguards with its
franchisees' servers. The settlement doesn't hold the company
liable for any violations or require it to pay any monetary
relief.
"We chose to defend against this litigation based on our strong
belief that we have had reasonable data security in place, and that
the FTC's position could have had a negative impact on the
franchise business model," the company said in a statement.
Wyndham said the settlement sets a standard for what the
government considers reasonable data security of payment-card
information and added that safeguarding personal information
remains a top priority "at a time when companies and government
agencies are increasingly the targets of cyberattacks."
The settlement closes the FTC's federal suit started in 2012. In
August, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the FTC could
proceed with the suit, in a decision bolstering the commission's
power to police corporate cybersecurity at a time when Congress
hasn't passed comprehensive data-security legislation.
The court order requires Wyndham to obtain yearly security
audits in line with the Payment Card Industry Data Security
Standard.
It also stipulates that if Wyndham suffers another breach
affecting more than 10,000 payment card numbers, it must obtain an
assessment and submit it to the FTC within 10 days.
Write to Anne Steele at Anne.Steele@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 09, 2015 12:35 ET (17:35 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2015 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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