Latest news with #BrawnyMan
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Coinbase cyberattack: What users need to know about stolen customer data, password security, and more in $400 million incident
Stock in Coinbase (COIN), the largest U.S.-based cryptocurrency exchange, fell more than 8% Thursday on news it was the victim of a cyberattack, in which hackers successfully bribed overseas contractors to leak important information so they could steal customer data. The company estimates it could cost $400 million to resolve the situation. 'I'll never get out of this hole': Older Americans brace as DOE begins Social Security garnishments Protect your protein shakes. The Brawny Man is hunkier than ever In Seattle, a group of friends wanted to live together—so they built their own apartment building While investors may be concerned, Coinbase customers undoubtedly are as well. Here's what users of the crypto exchange need to know. Coinbase reported in a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing that on May 11, it received an email from an entity claiming to have obtained information about certain Coinbase customer accounts and internal Coinbase documentation—including materials relating to customer-service and account-management systems. The filing said hackers sent an email threatening to publish customers' personal data if Coinbase did not pay a $20 million ransom, which CEO Brian Armstrong confirmed on X was specifically for '$20 million in Bitcoin.' According to the SEC filing, Coinbase learned the cybercriminals obtained the data by paying off multiple overseas contractors or employees working in support roles. Once detected, Coinbase immediately terminated those involved. Coinbase said it did not pay the ransom and has been working with law enforcement to investigate the breach. It's establishing a $20 million reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsible for the attack. No. The SEC filing said the data breach did not compromise customer passwords or private keys. According to the SEC filing, neither 'targeted contractors' nor 'employees' were able to access customer funds. Yes, according to Coinbase's blog, the following personal information was compromised: Name, address, phone, and email Masked Social Security (last 4 digits only) Masked bank‑account numbers and some bank account identifiers Government‑ID images (e.g., driver's license, passport) Account data (balance snapshots and transaction history) Limited corporate data (including documents, training materials, and communications available to support agents) Coinbase told Fast Company: 'Expect impostors. Scammers—related to this incident or not—may pose as Coinbase employees and try to pressure you into moving your funds.' Additionally, the company outlined what customers can do in this post. A Coinbase spokesperson told Fast Company: 'If you receive this call, hang up the phone. Coinbase will never ask you to contact an unknown number to reach us.' Again, remember, Coinbase will never call or text, or ask for your password or two-factor authentication (2FA) codes, or for you to transfer assets to a specific or new address, account, vault, or wallet. Coinbase said it will reimburse customers who were tricked into sending funds to the attacker due to social engineering attacks. If your data was accessed, you should have already received an email; notifications were sent Wednesday, May 15, at 7:20 a.m. ET to affected customers. Flagged accounts now require additional ID checks on large withdrawals and include mandatory scam‑awareness prompts. As Coinbase monitors high-risk transactions, customers may experience delays. The company said it is opening a new support hub in the U.S., adding stronger security controls and monitoring across all locations, and will keep the community updated as the investigation progresses. This post originally appeared at to get the Fast Company newsletter: Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump just handed data brokers a gift—in the form of our data
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), under acting director Russell Vought, canceled proposed new rules this week that would have protected Americans' sensitive private data—including financial data, credit history, and Social Security numbers—from being collected by data brokers without consent and sold to advertisers and other third parties. 'I'll never get out of this hole': Older Americans brace as DOE begins Social Security garnishments Protect your protein shakes. The Brawny Man is hunkier than ever In Seattle, a group of friends wanted to live together—so they built their own apartment building The proposed rules, which were crafted in December by the Biden administration's CFPB director, Rohit Chopra, were aimed at protecting consumers from commercial surveillance practices that 'threaten our personal safety and undermine America's national security.' (Wired, for example, reported in February that U.S. data brokers were using Google's ad-tech tools to sell access to information about devices linked to military service members and national security decision-makers.) Proposed rules clarified that many data brokers are in fact 'consumer reporting agencies,' like the credit bureaus, which already must comply with the privacy and accuracy rules in the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA). For example, under those requirements, data brokers would have to get explicit consent from consumers before collecting and selling their data. But on Tuesday, the Vought-led CFPB quietly announced in the Federal Register that it was withdrawing the proposed rules, stating that they are 'not necessary or appropriate at this time.' The CFPB's argument against the proposed rules revolved around a single comment left during the public comment period about the proposed rules' 'propriety under the plain text of the FCRA.' Data privacy advocates have been fighting for years to make data brokers subject to the FCRA's privacy rules. The withdrawal of the proposal is a victory for large data brokers such as Acxiom and Epsilon, for the consumer websites that sell data, and for the vast digital advertising ecosystem that uses the data to target ads. While many consumers are unaware of the vast personal data marketplace centered around data brokers, privacy advocates immediately saw the death of the proposed rules as a major setback. 'The data broker industry is out of control—data brokers threaten our privacy, national security, physical safety, and economic security every day,' said Electronic Privacy Information Center law fellow Caroline Kraczon in a statement Tuesday. 'The CFPB's withdrawal of the proposed rules is another attack in the administration's war against consumers on behalf of corporate interests.' At the state level, California, New Jersey, and Vermont have passed legislation giving consumers the right to demand that data brokers delete sensitive personal information about them. This post originally appeared at to get the Fast Company newsletter: Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
UnitedHealth Group stock price nears 5-year low as bad news piles up for the health insurance giant
The stock price of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH) is sinking yet again this morning after reports that the private healthcare company is now under criminal investigation by the Department of Justice (DOJ) over possible Medicare fraud. 'I'll never get out of this hole': Older Americans brace as DOE begins Social Security garnishments Protect your protein shakes. The Brawny Man is hunkier than ever In Seattle, a group of friends wanted to live together—so they built their own apartment building The company says it has not been notified by the DOJ about the alleged investigation, which was reported by the Wall Street Journal. As of the time of this writing, UNH shares are currently down over 6% to $289.20 per share in premarket trading. UNH shares have not seen that low since 2020. Before today's premarket fall, UNH shares had already been hammered since 2025 began. The stock closed at $308 yesterday, marking a more than 39% decline since the year began. Over the past six months, UNH stock had fallen 48% as of yesterday's close. However, a majority of the stock's fall has happened in the past five days. As of yesterday's close, the stock was down more than 21% over the period—and today's further fall is only adding to its losses. Here are three reasons why UNH shares have fallen this week, including the latest news about the reported DOJ criminal investigation. On Tuesday, UnitedHealth Group investors were hit with a double whammy of bad news, which sent the stock tumbling as much as 18% that day. The first bit of that bad news was the announcement that UnitedHealth Group CEO Andrew Witty was abruptly stepping down from his role as chief executive. Witty had been in the role since 2021 and was a leader whom investors adored. During his tenure, shares in UnitedHealth Group had soared more than 60%. However, after the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December 2024—and the glee with which many Americans reacted to it—Witty wrote a much-maligned op-ed in the New York Times. Witty was criticized as being out of touch with the negative experiences of customers who have been denied coverage for critical and sometimes lifesaving health procedures. Announcing Witty's immediate departure on Monday, UnitedHealth Group did not give any detailed explanation of the unexpected move. The company merely said that Witty was stepping down for personal reasons. When a CEO abruptly leaves a company, it can make investors nervous. And nervous investors often sell, which is what happened on Tuesday after the announcement of Witty's departure. However, Witty's departure isn't the only thing that sent UNH shares falling 18% that day. Also announced on Tuesday was that UnitedHealth Group had decided to suspend its 2025 outlook. When a company suspends its fiscal outlook, it's a sign to investors that it does not have a lot of confidence in its financial projections for the next year. This uncertainty makes investors nervous and is another reason why the stock plummeted 18% on Tuesday. The reason UnitedHealth Group gave for suspending its 2025 outlook was due to the fact that medical costs for the company's new Medicare Advantage customer base were higher than expected. Announcing the suspension of its 2025 outlook, UnitedHealth Group's new CEO, Stephen Hemsley, said he was 'deeply disappointed in and apologize for the performance setbacks we have encountered from both external and internal challenges.' The suspension of the 2025 outlook followed a cut that UnitedHealth Group made to its 2025 outlook last month. That cut came after the company missed its quarterly earnings expectations for the first time in more than 10 years. Investors were surely hoping yesterday that the worst news for UnitedHealth Group this week was behind it. After the 18% drop in UNH shares on Tuesday, UnitedHealth Group's stock price closed down just over 1% yesterday—a sign the bleeding had mostly stopped. But now UNH shares are down more than 6% this morning in premarket trading after the Wall Street Journal reported that UnitedHealth Group is now under a criminal investigation by the Department of Justice over possible Medicare fraud. The Journal was light on details in what the alleged criminal allegations covered, saying 'the exact nature of the potential criminal allegations against UnitedHealth is unclear,' but it added that it was focused 'on the company's Medicare Advantage business practices.' The Journal's reporting of a criminal investigation follows a February report from the paper in which it said that UnitedHealth Group was facing an investigation from the DOJ over its Medicare billing practices. Insurers get paid lump sums from the government via the Medicare Advantage system, and if patients have certain conditions, those lump-sum payments could be higher. In its February report, the Journal reported that 'Doctors said UnitedHealth . . . trained them to document revenue-generating diagnoses, including some they felt were obscure or irrelevant.' It added, 'The company also used software to suggest conditions and paid bonuses for considering the suggestions, among other tactics, according to the doctors.' At the time, UnitedHealth Group called the Journal's report 'misinformation.' Reached for comment about the Journal's latest report, UnitedHealth Group referred Fast Company to a statement published on its website: 'We have not been notified by the Department of Justice of the supposed criminal investigation reported, without official attribution, in the Wall Street Journal today. The WSJ's reporting is deeply irresponsible, as even it admits that the 'exact nature of the potential criminal allegations is unclear.' We stand by the integrity of our Medicare Advantage program.' Fast Company has also reached out to the DOJ for comment. We will update this post if we hear back. This post originally appeared at to get the Fast Company newsletter: Sign in to access your portfolio
Fast Company
15-05-2025
- Business
- Fast Company
Protect your protein shakes. The Brawny Man is hunkier than ever
Brawny just went big on bulk. The Georgia-Pacific paper towel brand introduced a new logo set in a thicker font and breathed new life into its lumberjack mascot, the Brawny Man—all as part of a shift to stand out on store shelves and launch a new product, three-ply paper towels. 'We weren't just evolving a visual identity,' Amanda Earley, Georgia-Pacific's brand director for Brawny, tells Fast Company. 'We were launching a new product, shifting our full lineup, and repositioning the brand in culture, all while protecting what made Brawny special in the first place.' Bringing all this to market at the same time was a challenge, Earley says, but necessary to achieve the company's overall goals: to grow household penetration, drive category growth, and convert the brand's entire portfolio from two-ply to three. A bolder Brawny logo The logo is one part of that. 'We modernized the logo to make it bolder, more confident, and unmistakably Brawny,' Earley says. The typographic beef up was also a strategic decision to 'signal product superiority at shelf, reinforce brand strength, and help us stand apart in a space that often feels like a sea of sameness,' she says. Companies like Amazon, OpenAI, and Walmart have all recently made their logos bigger and bolder, but for Brawny, doing so was an imperative because of its brand promise. A paper towel brand that calls itself the strongest can't be set in a skinny font, especially after announcing plans to increase the ply of its products by 50%. So the company made a few changes to indicate its new weight class. Its logo uses flat, bold, black-and-white letterforms, removing the red shadowing of the previous version. It's also now set on a firm horizontal instead of a slant. The logo type is sans serif, except for the letters B and A, which have serifs that extend like eaves on a rest stop or ranger station icon. A bulked-up Brawny Man Introduced in the 1970s, the Brawny Man has undergone multiple makeovers over the years and worn his facial hair in various ways—the brand even had Brawny women as part of a 2016 campaign. In this newest iteration, the Brawny Man appears on packaging in the form of an illustration of a handsome, hunky outdoorsy type suitable for casting on The Bachelorette wearing his signature red-and-black plaid shirt. He appears oversize in new commercials, like Brawny's own Paul Bunyan—and he's eager to help clean up messes, whether they happen to be in the aftermath of a 40th birthday party or at a treehouse sleepover full of superstitious tween girls. Too often brand mascots 'live frozen in time,' says Jaime Robinson, cofounder and chief creative officer at Joan Creative, which helped develop packaging and worked on the Brawny Man's refresh. 'When you have such legendary brand IP like the Brawny Man, you want to approach it thoughtfully but bravely,' Robinson says. It was all about striking the right balance between familiarity and modernity, according to Holly Karlsson, creative director at Bulletproof, the agency that worked on Brawny's visual identity and packaging design. And by 'retaining his rugged dependability while evolving his personality to feel more authentic, warm, and human,' she says, Bulletproof hoped to do just that. The new Brawny Man is a gentle giant with a bold logo to match.
