MLD Mortgage, which trades as The Money Store, has told the Texas attorney general's office that 1,367 Texas residents were affected in a recent hack, drawing three federal class-action complaints — the same disclose-then-litigate pattern seen in September at Affordable Mortgage Advisors, Gold Star Mortgage and NFM Lending, where the alleged attackers claimed to have taken 2 terabytes. Cybersecurity blogs had earlier attributed The Money Store's intrusion to the ransomware gang Storm. The Florham Park, New Jersey-based retail lender wrote about US$1.7 billion in originations last year and runs 218 originators across 48 branches. The same reporting covers a pair of class actions against real estate platform Redfin over a March incident involving a single employee account that affected 55 Massachusetts residents, and a US$5.3 million settlement this summer by vendor SitusAMC covering more than 600,000 class members. Why it matters: mid-market lenders are absorbing ransomware hits and immediate litigation while origination volumes are thin, and no sued lender has yet filed a formal response.

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