As businesses continue to apply for relief through Small Business Administration (SBA) programs, SBA's Carol R. Wilkerson announced that nearly 8,000 business owners' information may have been exposed to unauthorized users on March 29, 2020. This incident only affected the Disaster Loan Program and not the Paycheck Protection Program. The SBA has notified the business owners that may have been affected and offered them a year of free credit monitoring.
At this time, the SBA has stated that the affected part of the system that allowed unauthorized users to view business owners' information has been disabled. Even though the vulnerability has been reportedly addressed, we recommend any business owners that applied for relief through the Disaster Loan Program to check their accounts and review their credit reports for any unusual or unauthorized activity. This should serve as a reminder to routinely review business accounts and personal accounts to catch any unauthorized uses early and mitigate the resulting issues.
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Originally published July 1, 2020.
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