Chick-Fil-A Credit Card Breach: 9K Customers Could Be Affected

Chick-fil-A is currently investigating a possible credit card breach that may have occurred at multiple restaurants.

The Daily Mail reports that the popular fast food chain made an official announcement about the possible breach on Wednesday.

If the credit card breach did take place, one report claims that nearly 9,000 credit card customers could be affected.

According to the report, there are five key states that may have been targeted through the Chick-fil-A credit card breach — Virginia, Texas, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Georgia.

The popular fast food chain, which is based in Georgia, was first made aware of the potential credit card breach when some of the company’s contacts within the payment industry notified them of “limited suspicious payment card activity.”

According to the Chick-fil-A website, the company received an initial report of the suspicious activity on Friday, December 19. Federal authorities have been notified.

The company addressed the issue as well as their obligation when it comes to handling the issue in an official statement on their website.

“We take our obligation to protect customer information seriously, and we are working with leading IT security firms, law enforcement and our payment industry contacts to determine all of the facts. We want to assure our customers we are working hard to investigate these events and will share additional facts as we are able to do so.”

The statement further addressed what actions would be taken by Chick-fil-A if their current investigation proves that a credit card breach took place.

“Any fraudulent charges will be the responsibility of either Chick-fil-A or the bank that issued the card. If our customers are impacted, we will arrange for free identity protection services, including credit monitoring.”

According to Krebs on Security, the supposed Chick-fil-A credit card breach might have been going on for nearly ten months.

The security news website, headed by journalist Brian Krebs, made an official report about its discovery of the supposed credit card breach. The report claims that the site first heard about the possible compromising of payment systems located within Chick-fil-A restaurants in November, but there was not enough evidence to back those “spotty” claims at the time.

However, according to the website, that all changed in late December 2014.

“Just before Christmas, one of the major credit card associations issued an alert to several financial institutions about a breach at an unnamed retailer that lasted between December 2, 2013 and September 30, 2014.”

Chick-Fil-A currently has over 1,850 restaurants in more than 40 states, as well as the District of Columbia. The fast food chain reportedly generated more than $5 billion in annual sales in 2014 alone.

[Image Credit: Time]