Google is notifying users about a data breach affecting its Fi network users – that a part of their stored information was stolen.
The company blamed one of its third-party vendors for this breach and says it’s now working with it to secure the data. While it’s assuring that no sensitive data was stolen, some users state the consequences otherwise.
Google Fi Data Breach
Google Fi, the company’s Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) has suffered an indirect data breach incident, leading to threat actors accessing some part of the customers account data. In a warning email sent to affected users, Google blamed one of its third-party services for the cause.
Though Google didn’t name the concerned third-party vendor, Fi service uses US Cellular and T-Mobile for processing user requests. And with the latter company disclosing a mega data breach mid last month, the third-party in this scene could be T-Mobile.
In its disclosure, T-Mobile said the data of around 37 million postpaid and prepaid customers were breached, but that didn’t contain sensitive information like passwords, payment information or the social security numbers.
Now, Google says the same thing – noting that no PINs or text message/call contents were taken. The threat actors had accessed other identifiable data like users’ phone numbers, account status, SMS card serial numbers, and some service plan information.
Though Google assured there’s nothing to worry about and has been working with its partners to secure the data – a user who was intimated by Google of this data breach claims the other way. Sharing an excerpt of Google’s warning email, the user said their mobile phone service was transferred from [their] SIM card to another SIM card” for almost two hours on January 1st!
Soon, they started receiving password reset notifications of various online accounts, including his Outlook, their crypto wallet account, and Authy 2FA codes. More analysis revealed that attackers had used their number to receive text messages from these services, to access them.
The customer had to turn off the network access on their iPhone to stop it and switch it on again to regain access. Although, they aren’t sure if this technique solved the issue.