A pedestrian walks past an AT&T store in New York, USA
Scott Mlyn | CNBC
AT&T announced Saturday that it was investigating a two-week-old data breach that released millions of customers’ data on the dark web, a part of the Internet accessible only using special software.
The company reset the passcodes of the 7.6 million current users who were affected and said it was actively contacting those customers, as well as the 65.4 million former account holders whose data was affected. also been compromised.
“To date, this incident has not had a material impact on AT&T’s operations,” the company wrote in a statement Saturday.
AT&T’s preliminary review found that the leaked data was from approximately 2019 or earlier and included personal information such as names, home addresses, phone numbers, dates of birth and Social Security numbers. The dataset does not contain personal financial information or call history.
AT&T encouraged users, who will receive an email if affected, to create fraud alert accounts and monitor their account activity and credit reports. The company has not yet identified the source of the leak.
In February, AT&T customers experienced an hours-long cellular network outage, which the company said was the result of a system issue and not a cyberattack. The company’s CEO, John Stankey, later apologized for the incident and issued customer credits to those affected.
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