Morgan Stanley agrees to pay fine for failing to protect personal identifying info

Morgan Stanley MS, +1.48% has agreed to pay a $35 million fine for failing to protect personal identifying information on about 15 million customers, the Securities and Exchange Commission said Tuesday. The investment bank hired a moving company that then sold to a third party “thousands of Morgan Stanley devices including servers and hard drives, some of which contained personal identifying information of customers,” the SEC said. The devices were resold on an internet auction site without removal of the personal information, the SEC said. Morgan Stanley consented to the SEC’s order without admitting or denying its findings. Shares of Morgan Stanley are down 9.6% in 2022 compared to an 18.2% drop by the S&P 500.