(Bloomberg) -- One of Sweden’s largest private insurers says it inadvertently allowed some of the world’s biggest tech companies to gain access to private data in a breach that affected up to 1 million clients.
Folksam Group, which oversees about $50 billion in insurance assets, said it shared client data with Facebook, Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn and Adobe, according to a statement on Tuesday. The firm said it discovered the breach after an internal audit.
“We understand that this can cause concern among our customers and we take what has happened seriously,” Folksam said. “We have immediately stopped sharing this personal information and requested that it be deleted.”
Folksam, which is a major investor in a number of Sweden’s biggest companies, said the breach happened as it was trying to “analyze and give our customers customized offers.”
“But unfortunately we have not done it in the right way,” Jens Wikstrom, Folksam’s head of marketing and sales, said.
Folksam said it has reported the breach to Sweden’s Data Inspectorate.
Some of the data shared “can be considered sensitive,” such as information revealing union membership and pregnancy insurance, it said. Folksam has asked the companies that received the data as a result of the error to delete it.
For now, there’s no indication that “the information has been used by third parties in any improper manner,” it said.
