Marriott looks to reboot loyalty plan after cyber attack
(Reuters) - Marriott International Inc will relaunch its loyalty program under a new brand name, the company said on Wednesday, as it seeks to undo the damage to its name from a massive cyber attack that led to millions of customer records being stolen.
The world's biggest hotel chain said the new brand, Marriott Bonvoy, will replace the existing loyalty programs – Marriott Rewards, The Ritz-Carlton Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest - integrating the three brands into one name, with the launch on Feb. 13.
The company, which owns the Ritz-Carlton and St. Regis luxury hotel brands, disclosed earlier this month that fewer than 383 million customer records were stolen in a cyber attack on its Starwood Hotels reservation system.
Marriott has phased out the Starwood reservations database after it acquired the hotel chain for $13.6 billion in September 2016. The hack began in 2014, a year before Marriott offered to buy Starwood.
(Reporting by Ankit Ajmera in Bengaluru; Editing by James Emmanuel)
