News: LFS UPDATE 1-Australia's Latitude Group says 7.9 mln driver licence numbers stolen in data...

(Updates with details from statement, and background)

March 27 (Reuters) - Australian digital payments and lending firm Latitude Holdings (LFS) on Monday said it has determined that 7.9 million Australian and New Zealand driver licence numbers were stolen in a large-scale information theft on March 16.

Apart from the 7.9 million driver licence numbers stolen, the fintech firm also identified about 53,000 passport numbers were stolen and less than 100 customers had a monthly financial statement stolen.

Several Australian firms have reported cyberattacks over the past few months, and experts say this is due to an understaffed cybersecurity industry in the country.

Latitude last week alerted that it had unearthed futher evidence and it was attempting to identify the number of customers affected and the type of personal information stolen by the hacker.

Customers who choose to replace their stolen ID document will be reimbursed, the company said in a statement.