I knew it...Ameritrade finally admits it had a security breach that caused SPAM

[vi edit]

http://www.amtd.com/newsroom/r...l.cfm?ReleaseID=264044

TD AMERITRADE Holding Corporation (NASDAQ:AMTD) has discovered and eliminated unauthorized code from its systems that allowed access to an internal database. The discovery was made as the result of an internal investigation of stock-related SPAM.

I worked the tech phones for these guys for about 6 months dealing with these calls in '05. The company swore up and down that it wasn't their fault.

I moved my 401k rollover to them and used a unique address under my own managed domain and started getting spam the next day for stock tips.

So the truth finally comes out. They had a security breach in their customer demographics DB that allowed people to mine out email addresses.

Wonderful!

 

[nakedfrog]

Want I should walk down there and kick them around a bit?

 

[ISAslot]

I just got an email from them about this. Here's a quote from it.

While Social Security Numbers are stored in this particular database, we have no evidence to establish that they were retrieved or used to commit identity theft.

What's their incentive for keeping any of this evidence, or even wanting to find it? Are they even seeking it? I know I was not asked by them if any suspicious activity has happened on any of my accounts.

 

[Miramonti]

This exemplifies ameritrade's way of doing business...if it doesn't increase net assets or stock price, they don't care, and its no surprise they've ignored this spam issue for years.

I've had an account with them since '97 and have seen nothing but endless resources go into aquisitions and consolidation of new client bases and little to nothing special put into their trading platform. If they didn't buy Datek 5 or 6 years ago they would hardly even have a trading platform to speak of, and have barely tweaked it since.

 

[tk149]

I received the same email from Ameritrade. I seriously want to switch brokers because of this and other issues. Any suggestions? How can I even switch brokers? Do I have to sell all my stocks and take the tax hit?

 

[her209]

Originally posted by: tk149
I received the same email from Ameritrade. I seriously want to switch brokers because of this and other issues. Any suggestions? How can I even switch brokers? Do I have to sell all my stocks and take the tax hit?

I believe you can have your shares transferred to another broker.