Attorney general: State will receive more than $220,000 in breach settlement with The Home Depot
Colorado will receive more than $220,000 in a multistate settlement with The Home Depot after a data breach that exposed payment information for about 40 million shoppers throughout the country.
Attorney General Phil Weiser along with attorneys general from 45 other states and the District of Columbia received $17.5 million in the settlement with the hardware store as a result of the 2014 breach.
“The Home Depot violated the Colorado Consumer Protection Act in failing to appropriately protect its customers’ data,” Weiser said in a news release.
“This settlement will help ensure that the business employs proper measures the future and demonstrates that we take seriously the right of Colorado Consumers.”
The money the state receives through the settlement will be used to reimburse the state actual costs and attorneys fees, and will allow future consumer fraud or antitrust enforcement, consumer education or public welfare purposes, according to the release.
Coloradans who were personally affected by the breach have already been compensated through a previous settlement.
Between April 10, 2014 and Sept. 13, 2014, hackers gained access to the hardware stores’ networked and installed malware within the stores self-checkout system.
This allowed the hackers to obtain payment card information from customers utilizing self-checkout lanes throughout The Home Depot locations nation-wide, according to the release.
In addition to the multimillion dollar settlement The Home Depot has agreed to pay, the company has said it will implement and maintain a series of data security practices that will strengthen the information security program and protect consumers personal information, according to the release.