Sage, a major software company in the UK, has recently been hacked. The security breach potentially affects people working at 280 firms in the UK.
Sage provides payroll and payment software as well as accounting software to businesses. The company has just acknowledged a hack, seemingly originating from an ‘internal’ login. The hack affects 280 of its customers in the UK.
Apparently, the Sage is working in close collaboration with the British Police to find the perpetrators of the security breach. Also, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is aware of the matter. The ICO is responsible for implementing the data protection Act, which was brought into the Law in 1998.
The security breach appears to originate from a Sage corporate login. As of now, it is not clear whether the hacker only viewed the personal information of employees or whether they obtained a copy. If the latter happened, the investigation will take a serious turn, as it would mean the hacker has personal information of many employees.
Sage, as mentioned earlier, offers enterprise software related to accounting and payment. The company is the third-largest distributor of enterprise resource planning software in the world. To help you understand the gravity of breach, consider this; Sage has 13,400 employees and 6.1 million customers across the globe.
Sage is taking the security breach seriously. A spokesperson for the company said that “We are currently investigating unofficial access to customer database using an internal login. We are currently not at liberty to provide any more information as this is an open investigation with the police. Our clients remain our primary priority. We are offering advisories to those affected.” Sage informed all affected customers of the data breach. They advised the customers to observe their software for any unusual activity.
Sage, founded in 1981 has an annual income of £1.3 billion. The company, last month, reported that it was positive it would increase revenue by 6% in the current year. Sage I the only technology stock remaining in the too stock exchange, the FTSE 100, in the UK.
The breach may do Sage a lot of harm financially. On October 21, 2015, TalkTalk suffered a similar breach, compromising personal customer data. The telecoms company lost 101,000 customers and made £60 million in losses as a result of the security breach. If something close to that happens to Sage, it could lose a lot of the success it has achieved this far.