Starwood Hotels has confirmed a payment card data breach at more than 50 hotel locations in the US.
The hotel chain says a malware program infected point of sale terminals in restaurants and retail outlets at 54 hotels, but there was ‘no indication’ any room reservations or Starwood Preferred Guest loyalty membership accounts were compromised.
"The malware was designed to collect certain payment card information, including cardholder name, payment card number, security code and expiration date," the company said in an open letter addressed to customers.
"There is no evidence that other customer information, such as contact information, Social Security numbers or PINs, were affected by this issue."
Starwood said the attack began a year ago, impacting hotels at different times and ended in April this year.
In line with other similar attacks at US hotel chains recently, Starwood is offering affected customers free credit reporting for one year.
"We sincerely regret any inconvenience this may cause. We take our obligation to safeguard personal information very seriously and are alerting affected customers about this incident so they can take steps to help protect their information," the company added.
