The president of H2O Retailing, which operates the Hankyu Hanshin department stores, apologized on Wednesday after customer data leaked from the group's booking sites and from an email distribution contractor.
Naoya Araki, the president, told a briefing on the company's half-year earnings results: "I offer my deepest apologies." The apology covered the leak of personal information belonging to customers of Hankyu Hanshin department stores.
In October, unauthorized access was confirmed at three booking sites and other systems run by the department stores. Personal information including names and addresses leaked for about 1.26 million records, covering almost all customers of the booking sites.
In a separate breach, a contractor handling email distribution was hit by unauthorized access, and more than 28,000 customer email addresses leaked. The company said it has found no misuse of the leaked personal information and will work to prevent a recurrence.