Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. said recently the point-of-sale systems of a limited number of its hotels in North America were infected with malware, enabling unauthorized parties to access payment card data of some customers.
A total 26 hotels were affected, none in Connecticut, though the breach reached from New York City ”“ The Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel ”“ to Hawaii.
After discovering the issue, Starwood engaged third-party forensic experts to conduct an investigation, the company said in a Nov. 20 press release. Starwood reported the problem had been fixed.
Based on the investigation, malware was detected in certain restaurants, gift shops and other point-of-sale systems at the affected Starwood properties.
“There is no indication at this time that the company”™s guest reservation or Starwood Preferred Guest membership systems were impacted,” the company said in a prepared statement. “The malware was designed to collect certain payment card information, including cardholder name, payment card number, security code and expiration date. There is no evidence that other customer information, such as contact information or PINs, were affected by this issue. The affected hotels have taken steps to secure customer payment card information and the malware no longer presents a threat to customers using payment cards at Starwood hotels.”
“Protecting our customers”™ information is critically important to Starwood and we take this issue extremely seriously,” said Sergio Rivera, Starwood president for The Americas. “Quickly after we became aware of the possible issue, we took prompt action to determine the facts. We have been working closely with law enforcement authorities and have been coordinating our efforts with the payment card organizations. We want to assure our customers that we have implemented additional security measures to help prevent this type of crime from reoccurring.”
In a joint statement Nov. 16 (Nov. 17 Westfaironline), the boards of directors of Starwood and Marriott International Inc., based in Bethesda, Md., said they had unanimously approved a $12.2 billion deal termed “a definitive merger agreement” under which they will create the world”™s largest hotel company.
