Cyber-sickening…
Image courtesy of chanpipat/FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Anthem now joins the illustrious list of major companies to get cyber-hacked, although the health insurance company has yet to definitively say how many of its 80 million current and former customers are affected. It can definitively be said that all sorts of personal information was taken, including social security numbers, names, birthdays, employment data etc. – the kinds of details that can facilitate a very rude and inconvenient identity theft. Anthem says no credit card information was taken. Just everything else of significance. Customers can expect to be notified if they haven’t already been, and in keeping with corporate-cyber-attack tradition, affected customers will also get free credit monitoring and identity protection. Anthem, which just happens to be the second largest health insurance company, with Anthem Blue Cross, Anthem Blue Shield, Amerigroup and Healthlink under its wings, just might earn itself the uncoveted distinction of having suffered the largest data breach in the health care industry. Ever. However, it’s still looking to sign up new customers for that pesky February 15 Obamacare deadline. Naturally the Feds are involved and if it’s suspected that information was stolen, the FBI has graciously established the Internet Crime Complaint Center website: www.ic3.gov. Anthem also wanted everyone to know that the data of its associates was also breached if that’s at all reassuring, though I don’t know why it would be. Now go and change your passwords!
Bringing it on…
Image courtesy of iosphere/FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Don’t you just love a good athletic apparel smackdown? Today’s smackdown is brought to you by Under Armour and its CEO Kevin Plank, who not so graciously told Nike and Adidas to get used to being number two during a CNBC interview. Charming, right? But after posting some boffo earnings that boasted 31% revenue growth to $895 million, I guess he earned the right to say that. Except that Under Armour is, in fact, currently the number two fitness apparel maker, behind Nike. Just saying. In any case, CEO Kevin Plank’s numbers were no accident. The company’s profits were up 37% to $88 million coming out to $0.40 per share. That, my virtual pals, was one cent more than what analysts predicted. Plank’s fiscal logic for Under Armour is pure fitness genius: The more people exercise, the more exercise apparel they’ll need. To add to its fitness arsenal, Under Armour picked up not one, but two calorie-counting, fitness-tracking apps: MyFitnessPal for the very robust price of $475 million and Denmark-based Endomondo, for a cool $85 million. MyFitnessPal currently has 80 million users with Endomondo coming in at 20 million users, mostly in Europe, and with those two acquisitions under its svelte belt, Under Armour hopes to become “the world’s largest digital health and fitness community.” How nifty.
Hack Attack Comeback…
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles/FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Sony Pictures Entertainment studio head Amy Pascal may be stepping down from her cushy spot at the top, but she’s not out of the picture. The executive, whose emails figured prominently in the Sony hack attack in December, if only because she made some racist comments about President Obama and called Angelina Jolie a spoiled brat (though she did say sorry), will now get a four year production deal with Sony. While it’s safe to assume she won’t be working with Jolie, or Adam Sandler, or the President for that matter, she will get distribution rights to the the films she does. Not bad for someone who put her foot in her mouth, via email, subsequently earning herself some of the biggest A-list enemies imaginable. The movie “The Interview,” starring the cuddly duo of Seth Rogen and James Franco, was allegedly the source for all the hacking misery, as it poked fun at North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. The scandal cost Sony $15 million which coincidentally is the same amount of money the “The Interview” made from 2 million digital downloads – in its first few days of its release.
Pujonomics. 