13 Houston Area Hotels Compromised In Nationwide Credit Card Breach

HOUSTON, TX -- Thirteen hotels in the Metro Houston area were among more than 1,100 nationwide impacted by a credit card data breach of the InterContinental Hotels Group last year.

The hotels in the Houston area included Holiday Inn Hotels Holiday Inn Express, Candlewood Suites, and Crowne Plaza Hotels between Sept. 29 through Dec. 29, 2016.

Those Houston area hotels identified in the breach were:

• Crowne Plaza Houston - Near Sugar Land, 9090 Southwest Freeway, Sept. 29 -Oct. 26, 2016
• Crowne Plaza Houston Near Reliant - Medical, 8686 Kirby Drive, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016
• Crowne Plaza Northwest-Brookhollow, 12801 Northwest Freeway, Sept. 29 - Oct.17, 2016
• Holiday Inn Houston Downtown, 1616 Main Street, Sept. 29 -Oct. 13, 2016
• Holiday Inn Express Houston - Memorial Park Area, 7625 Katy Freeway, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016
• Holiday Inn Express Houston Energy Corridor-W Oaks, 2205 Barker Oaks Drive, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016
• Holiday Inn Express Houston N-1960 Champions Area, 4434 FM 1960 Road West, Sept. 29 - Nov. 10, 2016
• Holiday Inn Express Houston North Intercontinental, 125 Airtex Drive, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016
• Holiday Inn Express Houston S - Medical Ctr Area, 9300 S Main Street, Sept. 29 - Nov. 21, 2016
• Holiday Inn Express Houston-Dwtn Conv Ctr., 1810 Bell Street, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016
• Holiday Inn Express Kingwood - Medical Center Area, 22675 Highway 59 North, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016
• Candlewood Suites Houston IAH / Beltway 8, 1500 North Sam Houston Parkway East, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016
• Candlewood Suites Houston Medical Center, 10025 South Main Street, Sept. 29 - Dec. 29, 2016

InterContinental Hotels Group, which is the parent company Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza and Candlewood Suites and other hotels, announced the breach in February, but said at the time that only a dozen or so of the chains hotels were affected.

Read Also: Holiday Inn Parent Company Reports Massive Credit Card Data Breach

Meanwhile, the hotel chain retained a cybersecurity firm to investigate the breach and but the malware believed to have caused the breach wasn’t removed until earlier this year.

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IHG officials said the credit card breach is one of the largest in recent years, and it may not yet be over.

Cybersecurity analyst and and blogger Brian Krebs reported on his blog Krebs on Security that more IHG hotels may be affected.

In 2014, Krebs reported on the a similar breach involving White Lodging, the company that maintains Hilton, Marriott, Sheraton and Westin hotel franchises, suffered a data breach that exposed guests' credit and debit card information in 2013, but that brach wasn’t of the same magnitude.

Customers who used any of the group's hotels during that time period are advised to check their credit card information to ensure it was not stolen.

IHG has posted an easily searchable list of compromised hotels and the timeframes during which the information was vulnerable.

Cody Fenwick, Patch National Staff, contributed to this article

Image: Elliot Brown, via Flickr

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