Adidas Confirms Data Breach Impacting Customers Who Interacted with Help Desk in Turkiye

• A new batch of intrusion messages was sent to Adidas customers in Turkiye on Friday.
• The company informed its clients that their personal details were exposed due to a third-party service provider.
• The first announcement of this kind occurred one week earlier and was targeting buyers in Korea.

German sportswear giant Adidas has disclosed a data breach involving unauthorized access to consumer data. According to a company statement released on May 23, an external actor obtained client information held by a third-party customer service provider. 

While Adidas clarified that passwords and credit card data were not compromised, the breached information primarily consists of contact details from consumers who had engaged with the brand’s help desk, so exposed details may include personal contact information.

Customers of Adidas Turkiye received an email announcing that full names, phone numbers, dates of birth, gender details, and email addresses were exposed. A similar message was sent to clients in Korea on 16 May.

The company did not disclose the number of affected customers but announced their immediate response measures included isolating the impacted systems and engaging leading information security experts to coordinate a comprehensive investigation. 

Adidas emphasized its proactive stance, noting that they are currently informing affected consumers directly to ensure transparency and mitigation against potential misuse.

For Adidas, reputational risk management also comes into play. While the absence of leaked passwords and payment data lessens immediate financial exposure, contact information alone may serve as a precursor to social engineering attempts or phishing campaigns. 

This places even greater emphasis on consumer education around recognizing and reporting suspicious communications.

The Adidas data breach once again highlights the need for resilient, end-to-end data security strategies in organizations reliant on third-party services. Transparency and swift action remain paramount in protecting both brand integrity and consumer trust in an increasingly complex threat environment.