AT&T apologizes to customers for recent data breach

AT&T is currently apologizing to customers for a security breach caused by one of its employees who illegally accessed personal information for a small number the carrier’s subscribers. Some of the compromised information includes social security and driver’s license numbers of the affected customers. AT&T says the incident took place this past August and further discussed the matter in a letter to the Vermont attorney general.

“We recently determined that one of our employees violated our strict privacy and security guidelines by accessing your account without authorization in August 2014, and while doing so, would have been able to view and may have obtained your account information including your social security number and driver’s license number. Additionally, while accessing your account, the employee would have been able to view your Customer Proprietary Network Information (CPNI), without proper authorization,” wrote Michael A. Chiarmonte, director of finance billing operations at AT&T.

Chiarmonte also clarified that as a result of this security breach, the employee involved in the matter no longer works for AT&T and advised that the company is offering one free year of credit monitoring.

We reached out to AT&T for comment on the matter and a company spokesperson replied with the following:

We take our customers’ privacy very seriously and value the trust they have in us. Unfortunately, we recently learned that one of our employees did not follow our strict privacy rules and inappropriately obtained some customer information. This individual no longer works at AT&T and we are directly contacting the limited number of affected customers.

(via Threatpost)