Millions of AT&T customers recently had their personal information, including Social Security numbers, discovered on the dark web following a significant data leak. In response to the breach, the company reset passwords on numerous customer accounts after being notified by Techcrunch about the leak.
The data dump, which was discovered earlier this month, is believed to contain user information from 2019. Approximately 7.6 million current account holders and 65.4 million former customers were affected. The leak included encrypted passcodes that could easily be decrypted, along with Social Security numbers.
AT&T conducted an investigation with the help of cybersecurity experts and found no evidence of unauthorized access leading to the leak. The company is reaching out to impacted customers and offering credit monitoring services where applicable.
Among the leaked data are full names, email addresses, mailing addresses, phone numbers, dates of birth, AT&T account numbers, and passcodes. Affected customers have been advised to reset passwords and set up fraud alerts with the major credit bureaus.
This data leak comes on the heels of a nationwide cellular service outage in February that lasted nearly 12 hours for millions of AT&T customers. The outage was attributed to a software update issue and not a cyberattack. The FBI and Department of Homeland Security are investigating the matter while AT&T provided affected customers with a $5 credit for the inconvenience.
