'Nearly all' AT&T customers' data stolen in huge breach



AT&T issued a Friday press release that stated "nearly all" of its customers' call and text records were stolen in a massive data breach.

According to the telecommunication company, the sensitive information was "illegally downloaded from our workspace on a third-party cloud platform." It noted that it has launched an investigation into the incident, partnering with "leading cybersecurity experts to understand the nature and scope of the criminal activity."

'Incredibly sensitive pieces of personal information.'

AT&T said that it believes at least one individual involved in the breach has already been apprehended by law enforcement, but it continues to work with authorities to arrest all of those responsible and "close off the illegal access point."

The company's investigation has so far determined that the hackers swiped the call and text records of "nearly all of AT&T's cellular customers, customers of mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) using AT&T's wireless network, as well as AT&T's landline customers who interacted with those cellular numbers between May 1, 2022 - October 31, 2022."

"The compromised data also includes records from January 2, 2023, for a very small number of customers. The records identify the telephone numbers an AT&T or MVNO cellular number interacted with during these periods. For a subset of records, one or more cell site identification number(s) associated with the interactions are also included," AT&T shared in its press release.

The company noted that the stolen data does not include the content of its customers' calls or texts. Hackers also did not obtain any personally identifiable information, including Social Security numbers or dates of birth. Additionally, the data breach did not include usage details, such as call and text time stamps, it noted.

"While the data does not include customer names, there are often ways, using publicly available online tools, to find the name associated with a specific telephone number," AT&T added. "At this time, we do not believe that the data is publicly available."

According to a May Securities and Exchange Commission filing, the telecommunications company learned about the data breach on April 19, 2024, stating that a "threat actor claimed to have unlawfully accessed and copied AT&T call logs."

The SEC filing stated that the Department of Justice previously advised AT&T to "delay" informing the public about the discovery, pursuant to Item 1.05(c) of Form 8-K.

NBC News reported that the DOJ and the FBI are working with AT&T to investigate the incident. The Federal Communications Commission launched its own investigation.

Thomas Rid, a professor of strategic studies and the director of the Alperovitch Institute for Cybersecurity Studies at Johns Hopkins University, told the news outlet, "If you have somebody's metadata, you know when they go to work, where they go to work, where they sleep every night."

In a statement to NBC News, John Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab, said, "These are incredibly sensitive pieces of personal information and, when taken together at the scale of information that appears to be included in this AT&T breach, they presetent a massive NSA-like window into Americans' activity."

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AT&T data breach leaks 73M current, former users’ Social Security numbers on dark web



Telecommunications company AT&T announced Saturday that a recent data breach leaked the personal information, including Social Security numbers, of 73 million current and former customers on the dark web, TechCrunch reported.

A company press release explained that the sensitive data was published online approximately two weeks ago.

“While AT&T has made this determination, it is not yet known whether the data in those fields originated from AT&T or one of its vendors. With respect to the balance of the data set, which includes personal information such as social security numbers, the source of the data is still being assessed,” the company stated.

AT&T has launched an investigation into the incident with the support of internal and external cybersecurity experts.

“Based on our preliminary analysis, the data set appears to be from 2019 or earlier, impacting approximately 7.6 million current AT&T account holders and approximately 65.4 million former account holders,” AT&T added.

The telecommunications firm reset passcodes for the millions of affected accounts after TechCrunch informed the company about the leaked data, the news outlet reported. Passcodes are usually four-digit PINs that are used as an added layer of security.

AT&T has not found evidence that the data breach resulted from unauthorized access. Additionally, it does not believe the sensitive leaked information included personal financial data or call history.

“The information varied by customer and account, but may have included full name, email address, mailing address, phone number, social security number, date of birth, AT&T account number and passcode,” it reported.

AT&T noted that it is in communication with impacted customers via email and mail and will offer complimentary identity theft and credit monitoring services. Customers were encouraged to set up fraud alerts through the national credit bureaus.

“As of today,” the company stated Saturday, “this incident has not had a material impact on AT&T’s operations.”

In 2021, a hacker claimed to have stolen 73 million customer records, but AT&T denied the data breach. In March, the allegedly stolen information was published on a cybercrime forum, TechCrunch reported. Some customers have since confirmed that their sensitive data was leaked.

Last year, AT&T acknowledged that information for 9 million customers was hacked by one of its vendors, Fox Business reported. The data leak included Customer Proprietary Network Information, such as names, account numbers, phone numbers, and email addresses.

A company spokesperson stated at the time, “A small percentage of impacted customers also had exposure of rate plan name, past due amount, monthly payment amount, various monthly charges and/or minutes used. The information was several years old.”

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FACT CHECK: Did Solar Flares Cause The Recent AT&T Outage?

A post shared on Facebook purports a recent AT&T outage was the result of “powerful solar flares.” Verdict: False The claim is false. The outage was caused by technical issues, not a solar flare, according to AT&T’s website. Fact Check: AT&T and Verizon users with “certain older unlimited plans” will see an “increase of $4 […]

What we should all be asking ourselves after today's mysterious cellular outage



Many Americans across the country woke up on Thursday morning without cell service — but there’s still no explanation for what caused the outage.

The most affected were AT&T customers with 50,000 outages officially reported at 7 a.m. EST, but some Verizon and T-Mobile customers were affected as well.

Now, Americans are left wondering whether or not it was a solar flare or a massive cyberattack — especially considering just yesterday there was a cyber attack on the cellular systems in Israel.

This was a small taste of what life would be like after such an attack, but a bigger attack could have devastating effects.

“One Second After” author William Forstchen has been warning about this for years.

“If you saw the number of attacks, incoming attacks on our infrastructure, on our military, it’s unrelenting,” Forstchen tells Glenn Beck. “This is just a foretaste of the future,” adding that we should be prepared for a cyber attack.

“Cyber attacks could include our water system, our electrical grid,” Glenn says, asking Forstchen how widespread this could be.

“It could be targeted to a specific or in a general offensive, like what I would call a first strike scenario,” Forstchen says. “For example, take where you are, suppose water all across the board was shut down for 48 hours because that’s all electronically controlled.”

“Would be very bad within 24 to 48 hours,” he adds.

“If you lose electricity, that’s the fundamental building block,” he continues. “Then everything goes. Water, food, medical, all of it.”


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Americans across the country are experiencing drops in cell service, in some cases hindering 911 calls



Tens of thousands of Americans awoke Thursday morning to discover their cell phones were bereft of signal. In addition to being unable to touch base with friends, families, and coworkers, some users apparently were unable to hail 911.

While those affected by the cascading cellular service outages appear to be predominantly AT&T customers, clients of other service providers are reportedly experiencing issues.

Around 3 a.m., there was a spike in reports of AT&T outages on the website Downdetector. As of 9:02 a.m. ET, there were over 73,000 reporters of customers experiencing service issues.

While Verizon, T-Mobile and other providers similarly saw spikes, Downdetector indicated they were orders of magnitude smaller. Verizon and T-Mobile maintain that their networks were unaffected and operating normally.

A spokesman for T-Mobile told CBS News, "Downdetector is likely reflecting challenges our customers were having attempting to connect to users on other networks."

"Some customers experienced issues this morning when calling or texting with customers served by another carrier," Verizon said in a statement obtained by the New York Times. "We are continuing to monitor the situation."

While AT&T has confirmed that it is experiencing rampant outages, it failed to provide an explanation for why the failure occurred in the first place, reported CNN.

"Some of our customers are experiencing wireless service interruptions this morning. We are working urgently to restore service to them," the company said in a statement. "We encourage the use of Wi-Fi calling until service is restored."

A spokesman for the company indicated further that AT&T's first responder network nevertheless remains operational.

The outages prompted some speculation online about possibly wicked causes, such as an electromagnetic pulse strike or a cyberattack; however, an industry source who spoke to CNN under the condition of anonymity suggested the issue is likely linked to a process known as peering, whereby cellphone services pass off calls from one network to the next.

CNN noted that the company was experiencing sporadic outages earlier this week, including a drop in 911 service in various southeastern states.

Blaze News reached out to AT&T for comment on the extent and cause of the outages as well as a projected timeline on a remedy but did not immediately receive a reply.

Various municipalities and local authorities across the country have confirmed the outages, in some cases highlighting corresponding difficulties reaching first responders by phone.

The City of Upper Arlington in Ohio noted that outages were affecting fire alarms, such that first responders "may not be notified of an activation." The city advised residents to follow up alarms with a 911 call "for the foreseeable future."

The San Francisco Fire Department noted that while the San Francisco 911 center was still operational, 911 calls had reportedly been impacted for some customers.

Various other official channels, including the X accounts for the City of Little Rock, Arkansas, the Rockville City Police Department of Maryland, and Orlando Police Department in Florida noted similar difficulties. A common recommendation: Use family or friends as proxies for 911 calls or call from a landline.

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AT&T announces it's shuttering its flagship store in Democrat-controlled San Francisco, citing change in 'consumer shopping habits'



AT&T revealed Thursday it is joining the host of companies that have already shuttered their anchor stores in the Democrat-controlled city of San Francisco.

The company's 24,000-square-foot flagship store, a prominent fixture in the downtown's Union Square, will be closing August 1.

Chris Collins, a spokesman for the telecommunications giant, told the San Francisco Standard, "Consumer shopping habits continue to change, and we're changing with them. ... That means serving customers where they are through the right mix of retail stores, digital channels and our phone-based care team."

Consumer shopping habits have changed drastically since leftists successfully passed Proposition 47 in 2014 — a leftist California ballot initiative that effectively decriminalized thefts under $950.

Collins noted, "All retail employees affected by this change will be offered jobs at one of our other many retail locations within the city."

AT&T will still have a presence in the city, where it still has over 10 stores and licensed retailers.

The news of the closure broke just hours after Cinemark Holdings, Inc., revealed it too was ditching the crime-ridden and excrement-littered city, shuttering its theater in the downtown Westfield San Francisco Centre mall, which has seen 46% of its stores close since the pandemic.

A spokesman for the company told Fox Business, "Cinemark can confirm it has decided to permanently close the Century San Francisco Centre 9 and XD theater shortly before the conclusion of its lease term following a comprehensive review of local business conditions."

Months after announcing it would peel back its Banana Republic presence in Union Square and shutter the Atheleta store on Sutter Street, Gap announced in May that it was closing its 73,000-square-foot Old Navy flagship store, reported the Standard.

Nordstrom's chief store officer also indicated last month it was closing its anchor location in the Westfield Mall, citing dramatic changes in the "dynamics of the downtown San Francisco market."

A spokesman for the mall, which has said goodbye to Office Depot, the Container Store, Anthropologie, and Saks Off 5th flee, noted the Nordstrom closure "underscores the deteriorating situation in downtown San Francisco."

TheBlaze previously reported that number of the businesses still sticking it out, such as Target, have begun locking large sections of their products behind security glass.

When the glass breaks, proprietors are oftentimes reluctant to defend their exposed property from the hordes of thieves who roam the streets in the broad daylight because San Francisco's victims are oftentimes subject to greater scrutiny than the offenders.

Democratic socialist Dean Preston, on the city's board of supervisors, recently threatened legislation to prevent security guards from drawing their weapons in defense of property.

\u201cThe Looting going on in war-torn Kiev is INSANE \u2026. \n\nOh wait, this is Democrat controlled San Francisco. \n\nNo one look or RT please. \n\nhttps://t.co/Rrp2Y61hhw\u201d
— Benny Johnson (@Benny Johnson) 1645984209


San Francisco, which comedian Dave Chappelle recently quipped has become "half 'Glee,' half zombie movie," scores a 2 out of 100 (100 being safest) on Neighborhood Watch's crime index.

The chance of becoming a victim of a violent crime is 1 in 186, and the likelihood of becoming a victim of a property crime is 1 in 20, as filmmaker Eli Steel recently discovered firsthand.

\u201cYou hear about how bad San Francisco is. I was filming a shot of my father , Shelby Steele, and in the ten minutes we were gone our SUV was broken into and nearly $15k of cameras stolen. Called 911 & they hung up twice.\u201d
— Eli Steele (@Eli Steele) 1686767367

According to the SFPD, between Jan. 1 and June 11, there were 131 reports of arson; 13,445 reports of larceny theft; 2,378 burglary reports; 1,070 assaults; 1,150 robberies; 91 rapes; 2,889 motor vehicle thefts; and 22 murders.

The city's crime and decline is not just chasing out businesses.

A comprehensive survey conducted by the San Francisco Chronicle last year found that 37% of current residents plan to be living somewhere beside San Francisco in three-years time. The city had experienced a 7% numeric decline in its population between July 2020 and July 2021.

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