Credit: Hilton Concord

There are many times that cyber criminals target bank network systems in an effort to compromise and eventually steal.

However, it is not always the banks that hackers target. They are now targeting convenient stores, online stores as well as hotel point of sales. This way, they get access to important customer bank details and personal information which then enable them to commit other crimes.

Recently a number of people in the banking industry said that banks had discovered a new way and target that hackers were reaping from. They said that cyber attackers had managed to compromise POS (point of sales) in restaurants and gift shops at most of Hilton Hotel establishments in the United States. Banks discovered a particular pattern of credit card fraud which was being employed by the hackers. Hilton has since issued a statement saying that it is investigating the claims.

The banks’ assertions were triggered by alerts raised by Visa. In August, Visa made confidential alerts to several affected banks. It stated that there was a security breach at some POS entities from April the 21st 0f 2015 all the way to July the 27th the same year. In the warnings, Visa included all the card numbers that it suspected had been compromised. However, according to the company’s privacy and security policy it could not disclose the entities where the breach had happened.

Following on the warnings from Visa, five banks came to the conclusion that all the credit cards involved had at one point or another been used at specific point-of-sales. All the cards had been used at Hilton premises at the time they were being breached. Among the Hilton flagship locations that were compromised include Doubletree, Hampton Inn and Suites, Upscale Waldorf Astoria Hotel and Suites and Embassy Suites. Several other Hilton properties POS were also compromised.