A reported Ticketmaster hack is said to have affected 560 million customers’ personal information. Photo Credit: Nahel Abdul Hadi
When it rains, it pours: As it battles a Justice Department antitrust suit and a multibillion-dollar class action, Live Nation is reportedly grappling with a Ticketmaster hack affecting close to 600 million consumers.
Australia’s Cyber Daily and London-based HackRead were among the first to cover the developing story, pointing to claims made by a hacker group called ShinyHunters. As described by HackRead, ShinyHunters indicated that it’d made off with a whopping 1.3 terabytes in customers’ personal data (including payment-method particulars) after breaching the Ticketmaster system.
Far from sitting on the trove of sensitive details, the group behind the alleged breach is looking to sell the information for a cool $500,000, according to a Breach Forums screenshot captured by the outlet. (ShinyHunters reportedly owns Breach Forums itself.)
Running with this screenshot’s description of the allegedly compromised info, the hack is said to have affected 560 million customers’ “full details (name, address, email, phone),” order and credit card specifics (“customer, last 4 [numbers] of card, expiration date”), and “much more.” Also included in the screenshot is what seems to be a sample of the allegedly stolen data.
Lastly, in terms of HackRead’s early details on the subject, ShinyHunters has reportedly reached out to Ticketmaster in connection with the breach. But the company hasn’t yet responded, and at the time of this writing, neither the ticketing platform nor its parent had issued a public statement.
Needless to say, however, this is a far-from-ideal development at an especially inopportune time for Live Nation, which is continuing to push back against the initially mentioned DOJ antitrust complaint.
Furthermore, even if a Ticketmaster hack did, in fact, occur, it would hardly mark the first time that criminals have managed to obtain customers’ personal information from a prominent business. Live Nation, which has settled all but one wrongful-death lawsuit stemming from the Astroworld tragedy, will undoubtedly be able to rectify the situation with the affected consumers in the long term.
Stemming the tide of related criticism could prove a different story. Justified or not, the Eras Tour pre-sale fiasco spurred all manner of customer qualms, which then translated into, among other things, enhanced scrutiny from federal lawmakers. On social media, many are already weighing in on the reported Ticketmaster hack.
Also populating several social platforms is a multitude of suspicious-looking Taylor Swift ticket-sale offers. Last month, a Lloyds Bank report estimated that Swifties had lost $1.2 million to ticket scams in the U.K. ahead of the artist’s June concerts in London, Cardiff, and more.
