[BreachExchange] Can't read my, can't read my... broker face: Premium Credit back online a week after cyber attack

[Destry Winant]

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/09/26/premium_credit_outage/

UK-based insurance services firm Premium Credit has hauled itself back
online following a malware-based attack that struck the business more
than a week ago.

Premium Credit underwrites insurance premiums for a network of
brokers, business and personal customers and has 400 staffers across
the UK and Ireland.

In a statement on its website yesterday that accompanied its return
after nine days offline, the UK and Ireland firm played down the
episode, adding it had found "no evidence of data loss" following an
unspecified "cyber incident".

External experts continue to investigate. "We have now restored many
key systems, and are working around the clock to complete our full
restoration," the statement concluded.

So what happened? The insurance premiums financer told El Reg that it
had suffered from an unspecified malware outbreak, adding that it had
taken its systems offline as a "precaution". In a follow-up statement,
received via email, Adam Morghem, strategy and marketing director at
Premium Credit, provided a fuller rundown of events.

On Sunday 16th September, our virus monitoring alerted us to a cyber
incident. We followed our extensive security protocols designed to
protect our systems and isolate our partners from harm. We then began
the investigation into the incident with external 3rd party experts.

Since then, we have been working around the clock to restore our
services for our brokers. Our trading systems are live with our
brokers.

Our call centres have been open since Monday 17th to support customers
and producers during the outage.

He told us the internal and external probes by infosec specialists had
not turned up any evidence of data loss. He said it has told customers
that any payment that was delayed due to the outage will not be
treated as a deafult so no default charge will be levied.

"We can only apologise for the disruption this has caused our partners
and their customers," said Morghem.

El Reg checked in with Troy Hunt, the security researcher behind the
Have I been Pwned breach notification service and normally among the
first people to hear about any customer data leak. He said he hadn't
heard anything yet, a good sign, though hardly definitive.