Some credit card information may have also been stolen

Oct 10, 2015 16:58 GMT  ·  By

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that its parent company, Dow Jones & Co. has been the target of a cyber-attack, during which data for some of its subscribers was accessed and potentially stolen.

Dow Jones, a News Corp subsidiary, is reporting that between August 2012 and July 2015, an attacker has illegally gained access to one of its servers which could have resulted in exposure of information for around 3,500 of its subscribers.

This includes names, addresses, email addresses and phone numbers, for both current and former Dow Jones subscribers.

The data breach was reported by US law officials in late July, and Dow Jones sent notification letters to all affected subscribers after an investigation by a security vendor confirmed the breach.

In the letter, Dow Jones Chief Executive William Lewis said that the attack seems to be part of a bigger campaign which also targeted other similar publications.

The attackers wanted to get their data on customer contact information, so they would be able to send unsolicited emails or letters, which could be used to carry out other types of cyber-attacks.

Additionally, the criminals may have also gotten their hands on some credit card information as well.

"As part of the investigation to date, we also determined that payment card and contact information for fewer than 3,500 individuals could have been accessed, although we have discovered no direct evidence that information was stolen," Mr. Lewis' letter states.