Home Depot still paying for data breach

Home Depot is still paying to recover from its 2014 data breach, reporting $7 million in breach-related costs for the first quarter of 2015.

It is estimated that the home improvement retailer has spent more than $50 million to deal with the fallout from the cyberattack in which hackers stole information for 56 million payment cards.

{mosads}The costs continue to rise even as Home Depot reaps financial benefits from the U.S. housing recovery. The company announced higher-than-expected quarterly profit and sales figures on Wednesday and raised its full-year earnings forecast.

At the same time, Home Depot executives declined to state how much they expect to spend in total on data breach recovery.

Diverting funds for legal defense work, computer network improvements and debts owed to payment card networks could “have a material adverse effect on the company’s financial results in fiscal 2015 and/or future periods,” Home Depot said in a statement.

The rising frequency of retail data breaches has revealed just how expensive a cyberattack can be for a victim company.

Target had paid $162 million to recover from its 2013 data breach as of Feb. 26, one of the highest figures on record.

On the other hand, Sony Pictures said Feb. 4 that it had spent $15 million to repair its networks following a crippling hack last year, much less than experts anticipated.