Copyright Men's Journal
Hyundai Motor Company, parent company of Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis, has announced it suffered a data breach in February 2025. The automaker says that the breach is absolutely massive. The personal data of up to 2.7 million Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis owners is affected, including data like Social Security numbers and driver’s licenses. Perpetrators Had Access For More Than A Week Hyundai AutoEver America (HAEA)—the department responsible for IT at Hyundai Motor Company (HMC) announced via a bulletin that the perpetrators had access to customer data for eight days, and that the company only discovered the breach months later, on October 30. Don’t worry, though. Hyundai Motor Company may have lost the data of more than 2.7 million of its customers, but it’ll also happily allow you “to enroll in a complimentary two-year credit monitoring service.” The exact number of affected individuals isn’t fully known. It’s been but 11 days since the huge breach was discovered, and there’s surely much more to learn about how and why this all happened. The breach followed two prior ones that affected European buyers, in 2023 and again in 2024. Hyundai’s Massive Breach Is An Urgent Reminder The huge breach serves as a brutal reminder: companies like Hyundai control more of your data than you’ll ever know. They gather not just information necessary for business transactions – like SSNs for credit checks or driver’s license numbers for leases – but also use your data and preferences to infer things about your personality with shocking accuracy. Several years ago, GM was caught selling customer data to brokers, who would purchase information about you, like your favorite places to go in your car, and use it to sell you insurance via targeted advertising.
