WASHINGTON, March 10: Some 32,000 Americans may have had sensitive personal data accessed fraudulently, an information broker said on Wednesday in the second major breach in the past two months.

British-based Reed Elsevier said that a unit of its US affiliate LexisNexis “has identified a number of incidents of potentially fraudulent access to information about US individuals”.

The company said it had notified law enforcement and was launching its own probe.

“Information on approximately 32,000 individuals may have been fraudulently accessed in these incidents,” the company said in a statement.

“LexisNexis very much regrets this and will be notifying all the individuals concerned and providing them with ongoing credit monitoring and practical support to ensure that any identity theft is quickly detected and addressed.”—AFP