Hackers on the darkish internet are hawking a database of 86 million buyer information that they declare have been stolen in an AT&T breach final 12 months. The information in query was posted on a Russian cybercrime discussion board on Might 15 after which uploaded once more on June 3, apparently garnering consideration from different cybercriminals and potential patrons.
Based mostly on an evaluation by cybersecurity information platform Hackread, the info incorporates dates of beginning, cellphone numbers, e mail addresses, avenue addresses, and even social safety numbers. The hackers say that the dates of beginning and social safety numbers have been initially encrypted however have since been decrypted and at the moment are seen in plain textual content.
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Individually, any a type of items of knowledge will be exploited by the mistaken individuals. Collectively, they might simply put affected clients in danger for account takeovers and identification theft.
The information are being linked to the identical ones compromised by cybercriminals in an information breach that AT&T introduced in July of 2024. Affecting “practically all AT&T mobile clients,” the corporate stated on the time that the info included cellphone numbers and sure cellphone name knowledge stemming from Might 1, 2022, to October 31, 2022, and on January 2, 2023.
AT&T blamed the breach on vulnerabilities with its third-party Snowflake cloud platform, which homes the shopper information. At the moment, the provider stated it did not consider the info was publicly accessible.
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AT&T paid a hacker related to the ShinyHunters cybercriminal group $373,000 in Bitcoin to take away the stolen knowledge and supply proof that it was deleted, in keeping with Wired. With legislation enforcement concerned, one suspect was arrested and ultimately convicted.
Responding to questions from ZDNET concerning the newest declare, a spokesperson for AT&T shared the next assertion: “It’s not unusual for cybercriminals to re-package beforehand disclosed knowledge for monetary achieve. We simply realized about claims that AT&T knowledge is being made accessible on the market on darkish internet boards, and we’re conducting a full investigation.”
Nevertheless, AT&T beforehand asserted that no names, dates of beginning, or social safety numbers have been compromised within the Snowflake breach, however the information now on the darkish internet include all of these items of knowledge and extra.
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In March 2024, the corporate revealed that buyer knowledge from 2019 and earlier had been leaked on the darkish internet, affecting 7.6 million current AT&T subscribers and 65.4 million former account holders. This leak reportedly included full names, dates of beginning e mail addresses, mailing addresses, cellphone numbers, social safety numbers, and AT&T account numbers.
What clients can do
If you’re an AT&T buyer, what do you have to do at this level?
“The unique breach of delicate information from AT&T was sufficient to fret their clients,” Thomas Richards, Infrastructure Safety Follow Director at safety supplier Black Duck, informed ZDNET. “Now it poses vital threat to their identities. With each date of beginning and SSNs being compromised, malicious actors have all the data they should conduct fraud and impersonate AT&T clients. In the event that they have not already, the affected customers ought to be notified and actively monitor their credit score for any indicators of fraud.”
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Past monitoring your credit score, you could wish to change your AT&T password and arrange multi-factor authentication on your account, if you have not already executed so. You also needs to think about freezing your credit score in order that no new accounts will be opened in your identify till or except you unfreeze it.
The issue with social safety numbers
Maybe most troubling, although, is the leak of social safety numbers, which have been used for nearly 90 years to trace the earnings of People to find out their retirement and incapacity advantages. However on this age of cybercrime, these numbers have change into weak. By linking an SSN together with your identify and different knowledge, a felony can simply take over your account or steal your identification.
Not like your cellphone quantity or e mail deal with, you possibly can’t simply change your social safety quantity. The SSA will concern new numbers beneath sure circumstances, together with identification theft. However you need to show ongoing hardship because of the outdated quantity being compromised.
Trey Ford, Chief Info Safety Officer at crowdsourced cybersecurity agency Bugcrowd provides an attention-grabbing take.
“In 2025, the USA continues to be counting on a static quantity (Social Safety Quantity) because the common secret identification code enabling miscreants to abuse our identification,” Ford informed ZDNET.
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“There are organizations promoting monitoring that revenue off this downside area,” he added. “What’s going to it take for us to wreck the SSN’s usefulness to unhealthy actors, to de-value the SSN as loot to be stolen for revenue – and to undertake a extra significant, higher managed, extra clear, and FAR safer choice? It’s time to think about the SSN part of public document, identical to your identify, deal with, and cellphone quantity, and institute a central and federated technical management system for authenticating and authorizing using identification information.”
