Target Corp. has announced that Chief Executive and Chairman Gregg Steinhafel is leaving the company in the wake of the controversial data breach late last year that hurt profits, prompted congressional hearings, and shook customer confidence in the retail chain store.

 The No. 3 U.S. retailer has named Chief Financial Officer John Mulligan as interim president and CEO and Roxanne Austin, a current member of Target's board of directors, as interim non-executive chair of the board, according to Reuters.

"After extensive discussions, the board and Gregg Steinhafel have decided that now is the right time for new leadership at Target," Target's board said in a statement released this week.

The company also announced that Target shares were down 0.9 percent in premarket trading.

Target confirmed back in December that it was the victim of a cyber-attack that resulted he theft of over 40 million payment card numbers

At least 70 million other pieces of customer data were also stolen, including customer's names, email addresses, and phone numbers.

Mulligan testified at several Congressional hearings, where he was questioned about Target's security operations, how the company first learned of the breach, and how quickly it notified its customers compared to when it first learned of the attack.

Steinhafel worked for the company for 35 years, and had been CEO since 2008.

Brian S. Sozzi, chief executive & chief equities strategist of Belus Capital Advisors, said he believes the change was a couple months overdue.

"I think the news today reflects Target's initiative to completely get behind this issue," Sozzi said, according to Reuters.

Target has hired Korn Ferry, executive recruiting firm, to help the company find a new CEO.

Company spokeswoman Dustee Jenkins said to Reuters that the board will look both "inside the retail industry and outside the sector" for potential CEO candidates.

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