2.5M Hacked Customer Records Including SIM Card Data Breached
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Personal data was stolen from 2.5 million of Italy’s cellular service provider ho. Mobile. The data was posted for sale online. The exfiltrated customer data includes personal details as well as information about the SIM cards installed in each device. The stolen data is posted on a dark web forum.
The hacked personal data puts customers at risk for identity theft and future email phishing campaigns. The stolen SIM card data makes each device at risk for a SIM swapping scam.
Ho Mobile, is a mobile cellular service provider based in Milano, Italy. The low-cost carrier is owned by Vodafone Group. The company has confirmed the data breach and stolen customer data in an announcement.
Recent Mobile Service Data Breaches
Ho Mobile is not the only mobile carrier that has been breached by attackers. American cellular service provider T-Mobile announced that it had once again been the target of a cyberattack. In this latest breach, cybercriminals also exfiltrated customer data. The company has not clarified how many customers are impacted or what data was taken. T-Mobile recently merged with Sprint.
This month data stolen from India’s JusPay payment service was also spotted on the dark web. One-hundred million customer records are selling for about $8,000 payable in bitcoin.
Stolen Ho Mobile data includes:
- full customer name
- telephone number
- social security number
- email address
- birthdate
- place of birth
- nationality
- home addresses
- SIM Integrated Circuit Card Identification Number (ICCID)
No payment card information was stolen by the cybercriminals. The data was posted for sale on a dark web forum on 28 December. The tranche of stolen data was spotted by Bank Security and later confirmed by Ho Mobile.
Customers affected by the data breach were notified with an SMS text message from Ho. The company has offered to replace customer SIM cards for free to secure the devices.
“You can go to one of our authorized dealers and request a SIM change free of charge, bringing your current SIM and a valid identity document with you,” said the statement from ho. For security reasons, customers will have to bring their phones and identification to a physical store to get a new SIM card.
What is a SIM swapping attack?
Mobile devices use a SIM Integrated Circuit Card Identification Number (ICCID) to connect to a cellular service provider’s network. The stolen SIM card information gives the attacker information about the country the SIM card is associated with as well as its home network and identification. SIM cards can be moved to other phones at any time.
In a SIM swapping attack, the cybercriminal uses a stolen SIM card to connect a new phone to the victim’s cellular service provider. Once the phone is on the network using the stolen SIM card data, the criminal will receive all of the victim’s incoming calls and SMS text messages.
People use their phones as a form of two-factor authentication (2FA) for online accounts and apps. That means that the cybercriminal can receive 2FA text messages to reset passwords to the victim’s email, bank accounts, and credit cards.
