AT&T revealed on Friday that a massive data hack, originally exposed in April, may have been worse than previously thought.
The call and text logs of “nearly all” of its cellular customers have been exposed in the breach.
“In April, AT&T learned that customer data was illegally downloaded from our workspace on a third-party cloud platform,” the company said in a statement. “We launched an investigation and engaged leading cybersecurity experts to understand the nature and scope of the criminal activity. We have taken steps to close off the illegal access point.”
The compromised data includes files containing AT&T records of calls and texts of “nearly all” of AT&T’s cellular customers from May 1, 2022 – October 31, 2022. Per CNN, at the end of 2022, AT&T had 110 million wireless subscribers.
The company said the data “does not contain the content of calls or texts, personal information such as Social Security numbers, dates of birth, or other personally identifiable information.”
“At this time, we do not believe that the data is publicly available,” AT&T said in the statement. “We are working with law enforcement in its efforts to arrest those involved in the incident. We understand that at least one person has been apprehended.”
Customers can visit att.com/DataIncident for more information.
[Original story below from 4/1/2024]
Current and former AT&T customers beware.
The mobile and internet service provider confirmed over the weekend the company suffered from a massive data breach that may have leaked the personal information of an estimated 7.6 million current AT&T customers and 65.4 million former customers, totaling 73 million users affected.
AT&T said that, roughly two weeks ago, the data set was leaked to the “dark web.” It’s unclear if the leak originated from AT&T or a third-party vendor.
Related: ‘I Want a Free Month’: Thousands of Customers Furious at AT&T After Widespread Outages
Compromised data may include social security numbers, full names, phone numbers, AT&T account information (numbers and passcodes), and email and mailing addresses.
“Currently, AT&T does not have evidence of unauthorized access to its systems resulting in exfiltration of the data set. The company is communicating proactively with those impacted and will be offering credit monitoring at our expense where applicable,” the company said in a release. “As of today, this incident has not had a material impact on AT&T’s operations.”
The company also clarified that the data “appears” to be from accounts created in 2019 or earlier.
News of the leak was originally posted on X by tech account @vx-underground on March 17, which claimed that “the stolen data is legitimate” and was leaked onto dark web platform Breached.
Today 70,000,000+ records from an unspecified division of AT&T were leaked onto Breached. No information is available to indicate whether it is a 3rd party compromise, or which ‘division’ this data is from.
Regardless, upon review, we can confirm the stolen data is legitimate.
— vx-underground (@vxunderground) March 17, 2024
Earlier this year, in February, AT&T suffered a mass outage that affected roughly 75% of the company’s total customers. CEO John Stankey confirmed that customers who were “most affected” by the service disruption will receive a $5 credit to their account.
Related: Maine Hacked in Data Breach, 1.3 Million Residents At Risk
“Moments like these are a test of resilience,” Stankey wrote at the time in an internal memo. “This is not our first network outage, and it won’t be our last – unfortunately, it’s the reality of our business. What matters most is how we react, adapt, and improve to deliver the service our customers need and expect.”
AT&T was down over 10.5% year over year as of Monday morning.
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