Data storage in focus of Italian security committee after Intesa breach

By Giuseppe Fonte

ROME (Reuters) – Italy’s influential parliamentary security committee will hold a round of hearings on data storage after a major breach at the country’s biggest bank, Intesa Sanpaolo, people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Tuesday with the subject

Intesa Sanpaolo is under investigation by prosecutors in the southern Italian city of Bari after it was discovered that the accounts of around 3,500 customers, including Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and former Prime Minister Mario Draghi, could to have been violated

The Parliamentary Commission for the Security of the Republic (COPASIR) is closely following the Intesa data breach case, the people said, speaking on condition of anonymity because these matters are confidential.

COPASIR plans to collect information by summoning people who may have relevant information, but at the moment there are no hearings scheduled for Intesa’s managers, they added.

Intesa issued a public apology for the episode on October 13 after Meloni acknowledged the reported incident in a television interview, saying it hoped the judiciary would investigate what happened and any possible conspiracy behind it.

The bank’s board last week appointed General Antonio De Vita, a former police officer who recently retired from the force, as head of security, a new division he created after the breach.

Bank IT security is a major concern for industry supervisors.

The rogue Intesa employee did not hack the system, another person with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters. The employee was authorized to access customer account details due to his role within the bank.

By extending access over a period of approximately two years, the worker was able to avoid triggering the monitoring system, which would detect, for example, an unusually high number of requests for data related to an account in a short period of time

COPASIR’s official agenda shows a hearing scheduled for Wednesday, October 23, for Undersecretary of the Cabinet Alfredo Mantovano, a senior government official in charge of intelligence affairs.

Committee meetings are held behind closed doors and minutes of the issues discussed are not published.

(Reporting by Giuseppe Fonte; Editing by Keith Weir)