Coupang Faces Major Data Breach, Affecting 33.7 Million Customer Accounts

Coupang, under investigation. The South Korean ecommerce giant has issued a note of apology following the leak of personal information of around 33.7 million customer accounts through unauthorized data access, which took place on Nov. 18th. The South Korean government has launched an investigation process to deliberate whether the company breached security regulations.

“We sincerely apologize once again for causing inconvenience to our customers,“ Park Dae-jun, CEO of the company, known as the Amazon of South Korea, posted on its website.

Coupang is under investigation by the country’s government, which has initiated a process to deliberate whether the company complied with security regulations regarding personal information, according to the minister of science, technology, research and policy, Bae Kyung-hoon.

Coupang logged the first unauthorized access on June 24th, but it was on Nov. 18th that the massive leak took place

Coupang reported to the authorities last November 18th, when it recorded a data breach. According to Yonhap news agency, one of Coupang’s former employees is suspected of the leak. The company filed the report to the police, who are conducting the investigation.

The leak has affected customers’ names, email addresses, phone numbers, shipping addresses and some of their purchase histories, although, according to the company, payment details and login credentials have not been affected.

The company has specified in a statement that the unauthorized access to personal information began on June 24th via offshore servers.