AT&T's latest massive breach shows the peril of data centralization
A 24-year-old hacker infiltrated AT&T systems — and accessed data on more than 100 million people. Decentralizing data could limit similar risks in the future.
When a 24-year old U.S. citizen living in Turkey can infiltrate not one but two of America’s largest communication networks while the rest of the world sleeps, something in the world of data security is amiss.
The latest AT&T hack involved the theft of calls and texts of over 100 million AT&T customers. Although the stolen files contained no personal data or text content, the hacker demonstrated how a reverse-lookup program could easily connect the call and text message metadata to the names of family members, colleagues, and, in some cases, a user’s general location and movements. Stopping short of issuing an apology, AT&T simply acknowledged regret for the incident and casually slipped in the fact that disclosure of the data breach was delayed for two months by the FBI and Department of Justice.
AT&T is one of many organizations that tout “cyber resilience” — a buzzword strategy that shows how well a company or government agency can anticipate, withstand, recover from, and adapt to cyber-attacks. With cyber-attacks rising dramatically in the past year — as the AT&T debacle illustrates — the term is now synonymous with embarrassing system vulnerabilities.
A 24-year-old hacker infiltrated AT&T systems — and accessed data on more than 100 million people. Decentralizing data could limit similar risks in the future.
When a 24-year old U.S. citizen living in Turkey can infiltrate not one but two of America’s largest communication networks while the rest of the world sleeps, something in the world of data security is amiss. The latest AT&T hack involved the theft of calls and texts of over 100 million AT&T customers. Although the stolen files contained no personal data or text content, the hacker demonstrated how a reverse-lookup program could easily connect the call and text message metadata to the names of family members, colleagues, and, in some cases, a user’s general location and movements. Stopping short of issuing an apology, AT&T simply acknowledged regret for the incident and casually slipped in the fact that disclosure of the data breach was delayed for two months by the FBI and Department of Justice. AT&T is one of many organizations that tout “cyber resilience” — a buzzword strategy that shows how well a company or government agency can anticipate, withstand, recover from, and adapt to cyber-attacks. With cyber-attacks rising dramatically in the past year — as the AT&T debacle illustrates — the term is now synonymous with embarrassing system vulnerabilities. Read more