British Airways Was Hacked and All My Points Are Gone. Here’s What I Had to Do.

I couldn’t log into my British Airways Executive Club account today.

And I received an email from British Airways:

British Airways has become aware of some unauthorised activity in relation to your Executive Club account.

This appears to have been the result of a third party using information obtained elsewhere on the internet, via an automated process, to try to gain access to your Executive Club account.

We understand this was login information relating to a different online service which you may have also used to access your Executive Club account.

Several fascinating things here:

• This issue is widespread, reported on blogs and multiple frequent flyer forums. I had people tweet me asking whether my account was involved in the shutdown.
  
• They appear to be implyig the hack was of Award Wallet (the only service I use to track my accounts). I’m skeptical. None of my other accounts have had any points drained.
  
• Separately in the email they say the login was successful but no points were taken. I wonder how they then identified which accounts to lock down?

There’s something squirrely about the British Airways email, they just don’t strike me as being forthcoming.

The email contained a link to the password reset page. I entered my account number and that generated a password reset email. I reset my password (by simply entering a new one) and I had access to my account again.

All of my Avios points were gone.

This is apparently a temporary condition and they will let me know when I can spend my points again though I can call to get access to the points earlier.

Is it too cynical to wonder whether British Airways is all too willing to lock down points redemptions in advance of next month’s huge devaluation?

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