National Public Data – Jerico Pictures Data Breach Investigation
The Lyon Firm is investigating a data theft incident at Jerico Pictures – National Public Data, a public records data provider, that specializes in background checks and, ironically, fraud prevention.
Contact our data breach lawyers to learn more about how to protect your personal information following a data security incident and to consider legal action. Class action data breach claims can help you recover compensation and hold any negligent party accountable for economic and emotional damages.
What happened at National Public Data?
As reported by the news site, Bloomberg, a massive data breach was discovered in April 2024, and a class action complaint has already been filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. The plaintiff’s complaint alleges that a huge trove of exposed personal data belonging to 2.9 billion people was leaked from the network at Jerico Pictures (National Public Data). Attorneys allege that the Florida-based data broker failed to secure billions of records, and as a result, were subsequently stolen by hackers.
A cybercriminal group that goes by the name USDoD has claimed responsibility for the data theft, and has gone on to offer the data for sale on the dark web for $3.5 million.
What Personal Data was Compromised?
Sources are reporting that the National Public Data public records data could include the following:
- Full names
- Former addresses
- Social Security Numbers
The class-action complaint was filed against Jerico Pictures, which does business as National Public Data. Jerico Pictures provides APIs for companies, primarly for background checks on potential employees.
The compromised data apparently includes names, Social Security numbers, and the names of their parents, siblings, and relatives, and an address history dating back 30 years.
The cyberattack is thought to have originated when a hacker accessed and exfiltrated the files from National Public Data and then passed them along to USDoD, the cybercriminal gang that is acting as the data broker for the stolen information.
The class action plaintiff claims that not only was his personally identifiable information (PII) stolen, it was originally collected without his consent, as he never willingly provided his personal information to National Public Data. It is unclear at the moment how much of the data on the Jerico Pictures network was collected and stored without consent. It is also unknown why the company stored such a great amount of data, failed to properly encrypt it, and did not properly discard old data before it was at risk.
Contact our data breach lawyers to discuss the class action process, and to discuss joining an existing class action. More details will be known in due time. We offer free consultations and case reviews for plaintiffs in all fifty states.