World Leaders' Credit Card Numbers Stolen

G E N E V A, Feb. 5 -- Organizers of an annual meeting of global leadersin the Swiss Alps said today that it appeared hackers had obtained"proprietary data like credit card numbers" of 1,400 prominentpeople.

But a spokesman said apparently no sensitive details wereobtained on thousands of other participants in recent meetings ofthe World Economic Forum, including former U.S. President BillClinton. "We regard this as a serious crime, not as a prank," saidCharles McLean, chief spokesman for the World Economic Forum. McLean said the forum, a foundation that conducts the annualmeeting in the Swiss ski resort of Davos each January, would haveits lawyers file for an injunction later Monday to stop furtherdissemination of the data obtained. McLean said details published Sunday in the weeklySonntagsZeitung based in Zurich, Switzerland, appeared to belargely correct, but that apparently nothing sensitive on Clintonhad been obtained.

Data on Albright, Mbeki, Gates The newspaper's reporters said they had been shown data on aCD-ROM containing 80,000 pages of information, includinginformation on Clinton, who was the featured speaker at Davos ayear ago. SonntagsZeitung said the CD-ROM contained data on 27,000 people,including former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, SouthAfrican President Thabo Mbeki, Microsoft founder Bill Gates andother top corporate executives. McLean said a preliminary investigation indicated the mainconcern was for the 1,400 whose credit card numbers were disclosed. He said the security breach was in "a remnant database thatcontained information about participants at some of our regionalmeetings that had been held in the year 2000." "So it seems as if the hackers were able to penetrate thatparticular database and obtain this information," McLean said."They did not penetrate our main database; they did not penetratethe Davos database, apparently." McLean said it was apparently incorrect to suggest thatClinton's privacy or security had been compromised.