PII covers information that identifies people, making its collection, storage, and disclosure central to privacy protection and breach response.
Search across headline titles and summaries.
Background for this topic.
PII (personally identifiable information) is information that identifies a person directly or can do so when combined with other data. Direct identifiers include names, government identification numbers, passport details, and email addresses; indirect identifiers can include birth dates, precise location, or unique account attributes. The term is used broadly in security, but its legal scope varies: laws and regulations may use different definitions, such as “personal data” under the GDPR or protected health information under HIPAA.
PII is a high-value target because unauthorized access or disclosure can enable identity fraud, targeted phishing, or privacy harm. It may be exposed through compromised applications, cloud storage, logs, endpoints, or third parties. Practitioners should inventory and classify it, collect and retain only what is needed, restrict access, and protect it with encryption or tokenization where appropriate. Monitoring and tested procedures for investigating exposure are important, while retention, deletion, and notification duties depend on the applicable jurisdiction and sector.
Twitter on Friday revealed that a now-patched zero-day bug was used to link phone numbers and emails to user accounts on the social media platform
A class action lawsuit has been filed against big-three consumer credit bureau Experian over reports that the company did little to prevent identity thieves from hijacking consumer accounts. The legal filing cites liberally from an investigation KrebsOnSecurity published in July, which found that identity thieves were able to assume control over existing Experian accounts simply by signing up for new accounts using the victim’s personal information and a different email address.
Twitter has confirmed a recent data breach was caused by a now-patched zero-day vulnerability used to link email addresses and phone numbers to users' accounts, allowing a threat actor to compile a list of 5.4 million user account profiles. [...]
Hackers attempted to extort the online survey platform QuestionPro after claiming to have stolen the company's database containing respondents' personal information. [...]
Tech giants and digital rights groups didn't like it, but at least it was a law The government of India has scrapped the Personal Data Protection Bill it's worked on for three years, and announced it will – eventually – unveil a superior bill.…