Globe Life data breach may impact an additional 850,000 clients

Insurance giant Globe Life finished the investigation into the data breach it suffered last June and says that the incident may have impacted an additional 850,000 customers.

Globe Life was founded in 1900 and is one of the largest providers of life and health insurance plans in the United States. It has a market capitalization of $12 billion and a total revenue that exceeds $5.3 billion.

On June 13, 2024, the company discovered during a security review of its networks that it had been compromised by hackers who had gained unauthorized access to one of its web portals.

Globe Life shared in October the first results of its investigation, which was assisted by external cybersecurity experts, pointing to a small-scale breach at its subsidiary, American Income Life Insurance Company. The assessment at the time was that the incident affected approximately 5,000 individuals. 

The company has shared the latest results of the investigation into the data breach in a new filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and says that the threat actor accessed specific databases maintained by a few independent agency owners that held personal data of about 850,000 people.

Although Global Life could not confirm if the information stolen by the threat actor extends beyond the nearly 5,000 individuals already identified, the company decided to exercise caution and notify the rest of the potentially impacted customers, as well as provide credit and monitoring services.

The potentially exposed information varies per individual and may include:

• Full names
• Email addresses
• Phone numbers
• Postal addresses
• Dates of birth
• Social Security numbers (SSNs)
• Health-related data
• Insurance policy information

Following the incident, the hacker contacted the company in an extortion attempt. However, Global Life says that it declined to pay a ransom to the attacker. The breach did not involve data encryption, nor did it impact the operation of IT systems.

Globe Life states that, at this time, it does not believe the security incident will have a material impact on its business, while costs, expenses, and losses stemming from it will be claimed by its insurers.