Hyatt Hit With Malware on Payment Processing Systems

 
Stay at a Hyatt at some point within the last few months? If so, you might want to pay extra-careful attention to your credit card statement for a little bit, as Hyatt announced yesterday that it recently found malware on computers used for payment processing.

Unfortunately, that's as detailed as the hotel chain is getting right now, which means we don't really know just how widespread the issue is, nor do we know what specific hotels in the Hyatt chain might have been impacted by the issue. We also have no idea how long the malware was on said systems, which doesn't bode well for Hyatt guests who have stayed at the hotels at any point this year.

"Protecting customer information is of critical importance to Hyatt, and we take the security of your payment card data very seriously. We recently identified malware on computers that operate the payment processing systems for Hyatt-managed locations. As soon as we discovered the activity, we launched an investigation and engaged leading third-party cyber security experts," reads a post from Hyatt global president Chuck Floyd.

"The investigation is ongoing, and updates will be posted here at www.hyatt.com/protectingourcustomers. We have taken steps to strengthen the security of our systems, and customers can feel confident using payment cards at Hyatt hotels worldwide."

Hyatt's only suggestion for hotel guests is to check their statements and report any unauthorized charges to their credit card issuer. At this point, Hyatt is not offering any kind of free identity protection service or any of that, as is sometimes the case when a company's security is breached.

As Brian Krebs notes, Hyatt isn't the first hotel chain that's had to deal with some kind of data breach this year. Hilton, Starwood, and the Trump Collection—to name a few—have all had some kind of credit card breach in 2015.