Former head of security at Uber covered up 2016 data breach

He had to pay the hackers $100,000 to keep them quiet.

A San Francisco jury found former Uber head of security Joseph Sullivan guilty of obstructing justice and willfully covering up a crime for failing to report a major data breach to authorities in 2016. This incident affected 57 million passengers and drivers, and the company hushed up the incident for a year.

According to Stephanie Hinds, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California, Sullivan worked hard to cover up the data breach from the FTC and took a series of actions that prevented the hackers from being caught.

Sullivan was first charged in September 2020. At the time, prosecutors said he paid the hackers $100,000 in bitcoin and forced them to sign non-disclosure agreements. The former head of security was also accused of withholding information from Uber officials who could have reported the hack to the FTC, which was evaluating the company's data security after the 2014 hack.

In addition to reputational losses, the company suffered financial losses - in 2018, Uber paid a $148,000,000 fine for not notifying drivers and customers of an incident within 72 hours of its discovery.