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06/11/2015
157,000 Customers Affected By TalkTalk Hack
Almost 157,000 TalkTalk customers are thought to have been affected by a cyber-attack on the company's website last month. Initially, it was thought all customers had been affected, but this figure was later reduced to 1.2 million customers whose contact details had been accessed by the hackers.
However, in an updated statement on its website today, 6 November, the company said the total number of customers who had their personal details accessed is 156,959. Of these customers, 15,656 back account numbers and sort codes were accessed. Furthermore, TalkTalk siad that the 28,000 "obscured" credit and debit card numbers that had been stolen "cannot be used for financial transactions", adding that they were "orphaned" - i.e. customers cannot be identified by the stolen data.
TalkTalk has said its investigations, as well as those by the Metropolitan Police, into the cyber attack on 21 October are continuing. An ongoing forensic analysis of the site found that the scale of the attack was "much more limited than initially suspected", with just 4% of TalkTalk customers believed to have sensitive personal data at risk.
In a statement, the firm added: "It was a difficult decision to notify all our customers of the risk before we could establish the real extent of any data loss. We believe we had a responsibility to warn customers ahead of having the clarity we are finally able to give today.
"We have now contacted all customers who have had financial details accessed, reiterating our advice on what to do to keep themselves safe. The financial information accessed cannot on its own lead to financial loss. We will be contacting all other affected customers in the coming days.
"We want to make customers aware that we will not call or otherwise contact them regarding this incident and ask for bank details or other financial or personal information."
Four people have been arrested over the hack so far; a 15-year-old boy from Northern Ireland, a 16-year-old boy from west London, a 20-year-old man from Staffordshire, and a 16-year-old boy in Norwich. All four have been released on bail.
(JP/CD)
However, in an updated statement on its website today, 6 November, the company said the total number of customers who had their personal details accessed is 156,959. Of these customers, 15,656 back account numbers and sort codes were accessed. Furthermore, TalkTalk siad that the 28,000 "obscured" credit and debit card numbers that had been stolen "cannot be used for financial transactions", adding that they were "orphaned" - i.e. customers cannot be identified by the stolen data.
TalkTalk has said its investigations, as well as those by the Metropolitan Police, into the cyber attack on 21 October are continuing. An ongoing forensic analysis of the site found that the scale of the attack was "much more limited than initially suspected", with just 4% of TalkTalk customers believed to have sensitive personal data at risk.
In a statement, the firm added: "It was a difficult decision to notify all our customers of the risk before we could establish the real extent of any data loss. We believe we had a responsibility to warn customers ahead of having the clarity we are finally able to give today.
"We have now contacted all customers who have had financial details accessed, reiterating our advice on what to do to keep themselves safe. The financial information accessed cannot on its own lead to financial loss. We will be contacting all other affected customers in the coming days.
"We want to make customers aware that we will not call or otherwise contact them regarding this incident and ask for bank details or other financial or personal information."
Four people have been arrested over the hack so far; a 15-year-old boy from Northern Ireland, a 16-year-old boy from west London, a 20-year-old man from Staffordshire, and a 16-year-old boy in Norwich. All four have been released on bail.
(JP/CD)
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