Japanese companies offer customer compensation after cyberattacks

GMO Internet Group is offering compensation for unauthorised trading losses and goodwill payments after a cyberattack, while Park24 has announced payments following a separate personal-data breach. GMO has refused a ransom demand and is cooperating with authorities.

• GMO will cover losses from unauthorised trading linked to the attack and pay ¥5,000 to every current customer of the affected service, including those without financial losses.· 1 source
• The attack targeted GMO’s Onamae.com Desktop Cloud service. CEO Masatoshi Kumagai said it potentially affected 26,739 servers and involved unauthorised operations on accounts at more than 70 securities and foreign-exchange firms.· 1 source
• Kumagai said the suspected attackers demanded $50 million in cryptocurrency and threatened to disclose company and customer information. GMO refused to pay and plans a security overhaul and an investigation with external experts.· 1 source
• Park24, operator of the Times car-sharing service, announced ¥3,000 customer payments after a separate data breach. It expects a ¥5.5 billion extraordinary loss from its response and compensation, and will stop retaining identity-document images after registration verification.· 1 source
• Japan announced plans for a team to simulate cyberattacks using AI to identify system weaknesses. Although recently disclosed PHP vulnerabilities prompted widespread hacking attempts, GMO has not publicly confirmed a connection to its attack.· 2 sources