Citibank is among the top four (4) credit card companies in the United States. In May of 2011 their computer system was hacked into. Roughly 200,000 thousand customers had their personal information compromised. Unfortunately, Citibank did not feel they were ethically required to notify the cardholders of the breach. Several weeks later, and issue of the Financial Times, published an article disclosing the events of the compromise. The release of this information forced Citibank to acknowledge what had happened. The information which was hacked, were the cardholders name, account #, and emails. Financial News also relayed, that during their investigation, even though denied by Citibank, they found that debit cards were compromised as well. What makes this situation even worse is the fact most cardholders had no clue there was a breach, until they went to use their cards, and could not. Citibank is not the only company who has not notified customers when their information has been hacked. Wards and Bank of America are also a part of this group. Another interesting bit of information, these breaches was not discovered right away. Some took place over a months’ time. When a news agency contacted Visa after a breach, they refused to give any information. They told the reporter, for security reasons, they do not release any information on a breech to its customers. This makes no sense at all. Global Payments is a credit checking middle man who acts between the merchants and card processors, had their information breached. U.S. card issuers' total losses from credit- and debit-card fraud is an estimated $2.4 billion per year, according to a Consumer Reports article in June. (Fox News, 2012) “Although no admission has been made, the Chinese cyber spies have been accused of hacking. “The list of those hacked in recent years includes law firms, think tanks, news organizations, human rights groups, contractors, congressional offices, embassies and federal agencies. “(Craig Timberg and Ellen Nakashima, 2013) Every time we make a purchase, either on the net or in a store, we are open to someone stealing our information. Social media websites, such as Facebook, Twitter, My Space and Pin Interest are offered as places to build friendships, share pictures and personal news, or just the things which interest us. Sounds innocent enough, right? Once you post information, it’s there for everyone to see. It might seem ok now, but is it something you might not want your boss or significant other to view? Recent studies have shown that one in ten recruiters or school admission personal monitor the social media websites for potential candidates. In other words you are being interviewed, before you ever have your face to face interview. To use the social media sites to promote you in a positive way, can have long-term positive effects. One of the prime threats to e-business is the skill of someone or some group to hack into its computer system and obtain personal data on its customers. Consumers need to have trust and confidence, so when they are doing e- business, their information will not be compromised.
VeriSign was cyber attacked throughout 2010. The management of this situation was very disconcerting. No one was made aware of what had happened until the following year. “The incidents did not become public until 2011, through a new SEC-mandated filing”. (Armerding, 2012) At this point no one is quite sure what was compromised. Since they are not legally required to give this information, and it appears they won’t.

This incident will surely affect their business reputation. Monster.com, suffered a similar situation. And again, did not disclose the breach to their subscribers. While doing the research for this paper, I discovered that companies are not required by law to notify their customers if they suffer a cyber-attack. How many other companies have been