francesca’s® Breach Incident Score: Analysis & Impact (FRA5032350111025)

In this Rankiteo incident briefing, we review the francesca’s® breach identified under incident ID FRA5032350111025.

The analysis begins with a detailed overview of francesca’s®'s information like the linkedin page: https://www.linkedin.com/company/francesca-s-, the number of followers: 39673, the industry type: Retail and the number of employees: 2326 employees

After the initial compromise, the video explains how Rankiteo's incident engine converts technical details into a normalized incident score. The incident score before the incident was 757 and after the incident was 688 with a difference of -69 which is could be a good indicator of the severity and impact of the incident.

In the next step of the video, we will analyze in more details the incident and the impact it had on francesca’s® and their customers.

On 31 January 2023, Francesca’s disclosed Data Breach issues under the banner "Francesca’s Data Breach (2023)".

A data breach at Francesca’s, a women’s clothing company, occurred between January 12 and January 31, 2023.

The disruption is felt across the environment, and exposing Social Security numbers, Driver’s license numbers and Account information.

In response, while recovery efforts such as Settlement with affected parties, credit monitoring services continue, and stakeholders are being briefed through Public settlement announcement, customer advisories for claims.

The case underscores how Settled (class action lawsuit resolved), teams are taking away lessons such as Companies must prioritize robust cybersecurity frameworks to prevent data breaches and potential lawsuits. Proactive measures, such as regular security audits and employee training, are critical to mitigating risks associated with unauthorized access to sensitive customer data, and recommending next steps like Implement stronger cybersecurity protocols, including encryption for sensitive data, Conduct regular security audits and vulnerability assessments and Provide employee training on data protection and phishing awareness, with advisories going out to stakeholders covering Customers advised to file claims by November 10, 2025, for compensation. Final approval hearing scheduled for November 13, 2025.

Finally, we try to match the incident with the MITRE ATT&CK framework to see if there is any correlation between the incident and the MITRE ATT&CK framework.

The MITRE ATT&CK framework is a knowledge base of techniques and sub-techniques that are used to describe the tactics and procedures of cyber adversaries. It is a powerful tool for understanding the threat landscape and for developing effective defense strategies.

Rankiteo's analysis has identified several MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques associated with this incident, each with varying levels of confidence based on available evidence. Under the Initial Access tactic, the analysis identified Valid Accounts (T1078) with moderate to high confidence (70%), supported by evidence indicating failure to prevent unauthorized access to sensitive customer data (implied misuse of valid credentials or accounts) and Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190) with moderate confidence (60%), supported by evidence indicating inadequate cybersecurity measures (suggests exploitation of unpatched/public-facing systems). Under the Collection tactic, the analysis identified Data from Local System (T1005) with high confidence (95%), supported by evidence indicating social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, account details, and addresses compromised. Under the Exfiltration tactic, the analysis identified Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol (T1048) with moderate to high confidence (85%), supported by evidence indicating data exfiltration such as Yes (PII/financial data removed from systems) and Automated Exfiltration (T1020) with moderate to high confidence (75%), supported by evidence indicating large-scale PII breach (suggests automated collection/exfiltration). Under the Impact tactic, the analysis identified Data Manipulation (T1598) with high confidence (90%), supported by evidence indicating identity theft risk such as High (exfiltrated PII used for fraud/identity theft) and Data Destruction (T1485) with lower confidence (30%), supported by evidence indicating no explicit destruction mentioned, but breach led to long-term trust erosion (low confidence). Under the Credential Access tactic, the analysis identified Unsecured Credentials (T1552) with moderate to high confidence (80%), supported by evidence indicating inadequate cybersecurity measures (implies poor credential storage/protection). These correlations help security teams understand the attack chain and develop appropriate defensive measures based on the observed tactics and techniques.