AT&T announced Friday that mobile customers’ text and call data from 2022 was illegally downloaded to a third-party cloud platform in April.
Pau Barrena/AFP via Getty Images
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Pau Barrena/AFP via Getty Images
AT&T said hackers stole data from “nearly all” of its mobile customers for months in 2022 and illegally uploaded the data to a third-party cloud platform.
The Dallas-based telecommunications company announced a massive data breach in submit application as prescribed And Press Release on Friday morning, said it believed the data was no longer publicly available.
AT&T has implemented additional cybersecurity measures in response to this incident, including shutting down the unauthorized access point,” the company added.
The company wrote that it first learned of the incident in April, but the U.S. Justice Department determined in May and again in June that “delaying public disclosure was necessary” until now.
AT&T’s investigation found that an unspecified number of “threat actors” stole files in April containing phone call and text message records of “nearly all AT&T mobile customers” from May to October 2022, as well as a small number of customers on January 2, 2023.
An AT&T spokesperson described the information taken as “aggregate metadata,” which contains information about calls and texts but not their content.
The records identify other phone numbers the affected customers interacted with, including AT&T landline numbers, as well as the number of those calls and text messages and the total call duration during specific days or months.
The document adds: “For a subset of records, one or more mobile site ID numbers associated with the interactions will also be included.”
AT&T says the data doesn’t include the content or timestamps of those calls and texts, nor birth dates, social security numbers, or other “personally identifiable information.” Though there’s one caveat.
“While the data does not include customer names, there are still ways to use publicly available online tools to find out the name associated with a particular phone number,” the report warns.
AT&T said it is working with law enforcement to apprehend the offenders and “understands that at least one person has been arrested” so far.
The company said it will notify affected users via text message, email or US postal mail and has also set up a website where current and former users Customers can check to see if their information is relevant.
Those affected may track a process online to get their phone numbers from calls and text messages in downloaded data. AT&T said the option to request that information will be in effect through the end of the year.
For those concerned about the risk of online scams and phishing, the site offers some helpful tips, including not responding to messages from unknown senders with personal information and ensuring websites are secure by looking for the letter “s” after “http” in the address.
It adds that customers who suspect suspicious text activity should forward messages to AT&T, and Report any suspected fraud on their AT&T wireless account for their group.
This isn’t the first data breach AT&T has reported this year.
In March, the company said it had reset the passwords of about 7.6 million users after discovering a Data sets on the “dark web” contains Social Security numbers and other personal information of about 70 million current and former account holders.
Individual, AT&T donated $5. for some customers affected by a nationwide power outage that lasted nearly 12 hours in February.
Verizon, Ticketmaster, Dell and Bank of America are among the other companies that have reported big data breach This year, affecting millions of people.
