Security Breach Forces P.F. Chang's to Go Old School

Reports of a security compromise for the highly Americanized Chinese food restaurant, P.F. Chang's, hit the web a couple days ago, but it's taken a couple days for the company to make a public statement.

On Tuesday, June 10^th, the company learned of credit and debit card data being stolen from some of its restaurants. Those specific locations have yet to be identified publicly, but the investigation is still ongoing. US Secret Service was notified of the incident on June 10, 2014 and has since been working to attempt to reveal the nature and scope of the breach. There's no data yet to suggest how many customers have been affected, but it's safe to say, that if you visited P.F. Chang's in the last month or so, keep watching your credit card reports for questionable charges and activity.

A statement and Q&A is now available on the company's web site here: Security Compromise Update

Hacking data seems to be all too easy these days, with the majority of hacks intended to capture as much personal and financial data as possible. P.F. Chang's is just another in a line of higher profile attacks. News of lax security is increasing and is a good reminder for IT Pros to take steps for a thorough, internal security review.

In light of the breach, P.F. Chang's has pulled out the old standby, manual credit card swiping machines to ensure customers can still pay for meals. Let's just hope the carbon-copy sheets get stored in a secure safe and not left in a stack out in the open, next to the plate of gluten-free eggrolls.