Telecommunication and Internet service provider ‘Three’ of UK were hit by a cyber attack early this week compromising personal info of at least nine million customers. According to the preliminary inquiry made by the officials, the hackers gained access to the database by using one of the employee credentials.
As per a news update posted in Telegraph, Three which is a subsidiary of Hutchinson Whampoa has launched an investigation by a third party on how many customers were affected by the data hack. After the sources report, the Britain’s mobile operator plans to contact customers to caution them against the incident.
Three has confirmed that no data related to Irish customers was leaked in the hack, as the cyber criminals did not get enough time to break into the entire network. It has also assured that no sensitive information of the customers like credit card and bank details were spilled in the database hack.
In a press briefing, the company’s spokesperson said that an increasing level of attempted handset fraud was being observed from past 4-5 weeks. And till date, almost 400 high valued handsets were stolen by thieves and 8 devices were obtained on an illegal note through upgraded activities.
The UK National Crime Agency(NCA) has arrested three persons in connection with the breach at the video mobile network company and said that the recent burglaries, and illegally upgraded activities do have some kind of connection with the current hacking episode.
Last year, a broadband provider named TalkTalk was penalized by Britain’s data protection regulator with a fine of £400,000 for security failings. The said web service provider had to go through a loss of £60 million as more than 4% or 4 million customers were affected in the data breach.
UK’s 3G and 4G service providing Three will also face a similar fine from the data protection regulator if the cyber attack proves more lethal from the customer’s point of view than suspected.
