A-B Says No Evidence Employee Data Compromised With Laptop Theft

By Jeremiah McWilliams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Jul. 29–A recent burglary at a St. Louis area-office building involved the theft of several laptops, including one that contained password-protected, encrypted data about a number of current and former employees of Anheuser-Busch Cos.

Laptops were stolen from an Anheuser-Busch office in the building, as well as from other business tenants, according to the St. Louis-based brewer. The company did not disclose the location of the building.

One of the stolen A-B laptops included data about current and former employees, dependents and some providers of employee assistance programs.

The theft was reported to the police and Anheuser-Busch is “cooperating fully” with the investigation, according to Tim Farrell, vice president of corporate human resources.

“At this time, there is no evidence that the theft has resulted in any unauthorized disclosure, fraudulent credit card applications or other identity theft crimes,” Farrell said in a statement.

Farrell said Anheuser-Busch had notified all affected individuals and offered free credit monitoring from Equifax Personal Solutions for one year.

The brewer didn’t immediately provide the figure for the number of people whose information was contained in the laptop.

jmcwilliams@post-dispatch.com

314-340-8372

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