Duke Energy is offering free credit monitoring and identity theft protection services to some customers whose personal information may have been unlawfully accessed on the company’s website.
The utility company recently sent notifications to affected customers stating, “This communication is to make you aware of activity associated with one or more of your Duke Energy accounts. We believe that an unauthorized party may have used elements of your personal information.”
While Duke Energy says passwords, financial data, and access to online profiles were not compromised, the company describes the situation as a “cyber incident” that occurred in May and was only recently discovered.
Cybersecurity expert Danny Jenkins, CEO of the firm ThreatLocker, says it is not uncommon for major data breaches to go unnoticed for months.
“As you get such a big platform, a big company, it’s hard to know what’s happening. Quite often, information is stolen, but not used right away. It might take months for data to show up on the web or for identities to start being stolen,” Jenkins said.
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Jenkins said most Floridians likely have their personal information unlawfully accessed several times a year.
“When you think about how many accounts people have, Netflix, Hulu, iTunes, healthcare accounts. It’s a staggering amount of data that companies are trying to protect,” Jenkins said.
Jenkins also said that consumers often have options to limit the personal information they share with companies.
“Duke Energy might ask for your Social Security number when you set up an account, but you don’t necessarily have to provide it. Most people don’t realize that’s an option,” Jenkins added.
Duke Energy has offered for affected customers to take advantage of the free credit monitoring services.
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