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The Home Depot's massive data breach may have been averted if the company had listened to concerns from security researchers dating back to 2008. According to The New York Times, former cybersecurity employees confirmed that the company was slow to respond to security problems, ignored repeated warnings in the past, and continued using outdated security software. The article also pointed out that Ricky Joe Mitchell, The Home Depot's former head of security, was recently imprisoned for "deliberately disabling computers" at a previous company.
Security researcher Brian Krebs has speculated that the same hackers were behind both the Target and The Home Depot leaks. The Target leak resulted in compromising 40 million credit cards, while The Home Depot leak affected 56 million credit cards.
· The Home Depot reportedly ignored warnings from its own cybersecurity team [The Verge]
· Ex-Employees Say Home Depot Left Data Vulnerable [NYT]
· Home Depot's Data Breach Could Be Bigger Than Target's [Racked]
· Target Chief Information Officer Takes the Fall for Security Breach [Racked]