Neiman Marcus, Target Data Breaches: 8 Facts

Neiman Marcus confirmed Friday that it suffered a data breach that extended throughout at least part of December, and which resulted in the theft of an unknown amount of credit and debit card data.

The luxury retailer said it learned in mid-December that its systems may have been compromised. "Neiman Marcus was informed by our merchant processor in mid-December of potentially unauthorized payment card activity that occurred following customer purchases at our Neiman Marcus Group stores," company spokeswoman Ginger Reeder said Monday via email.

In response, the retailer hired a digital forensics investigation firm. "On January 1st, the forensics firm discovered evidence that the company was the victim of a criminal cyber-security intrusion and that some customers' cards were possibly compromised as a result," Reeder said.

Neiman Marcus first publicly detailed the breach Friday, which happened to be the same day that Target updated its data breach notification, revealing that in addition to the 40 million credit and debit cards stolen from the retailer from late November until mid-December, personal information on 70 million customers was also compromised.

Are the breaches connected? According to a Reuters report on Sunday, investigators now believe that Target, Neiman Marcus, and at least three other retailers -- which have yet to be named -- were successfully breached at the end of 2013, likely all by the same gang.

Here's what's known about this apparent hack-attack campaign against US retailers:

[Read the rest of the story on InformationWeek.]