The Hamilton County Police in Cincinnati have charged Daniel J. Baas with unlawful use of property in the theft of data late last year from Acxiom Corp.
The 24-year-old Baas was formerly employed by database firm and Acxiom client Market Intelligence Group LLC of Cincinnati before his dismissal in June, according to a report in the Cincinnati Enquirer.
According to the arrest report, “On 12/10/02 at 12:32 P.M. the defendant did enter a computer belonging to Acxiom Corp. located in Little Rock, AR. Defendant did so without authorization or consent and copied information from Acxiom Corp.”
The case goes to a grand jury Aug. 18, according to wire reports. The police also said additional charges were pending.
The Cincinnati Post said that Baas, of Milford, OH, has a criminal history of arrests for illegally accessing computers.
For eight months, Acxiom was unaware that its system had been compromised. The company was notified of the hacking by law enforcement and police told Acxiom it is one of several companies that had data stolen. Acxiom spokesman Dale Ingram confirmed that but did not elaborate.
“It’s an ongoing investigation so we can’t discuss it,” he said.
Acxiom is taking several steps to ensure something like this doesn’t happen again, Ingram said.
“We had very high security standards, but it’s still troubling when one of thousands of servers is compromised and that’s prompting a very comprehensive review that includes some outside experts,” he said. “We’re confident that when everything is said and done what are strong security measures will be even stronger.”
