Verizon is grappling with an occurrence in which a hacker obtained a database holding business employee data, including complete names, ID numbers, email addresses, and phone numbers. The information is authentic, according to Motherboard, since the mysterious hacker reached them last week and they were able to confirm the data by contacting several of the numbers.
“These employees are idiots,” the hacker told Motherboard via chat. The hacker is seeking $250,000 in exchange for not leaking the database and said they are in contact with Verizon.
A Verizon spokesperson contacted Motherboard confirming the incident, saying, “A fraudster recently contacted us threatening to release readily available employee directory information in exchange for payment from Verizon. We do not believe the fraudster has any sensitive information and we do not plan to engage with the individual further. As always, we take the security of Verizon data very seriously and we have strong measures in place to protect our people and systems.”
The hacker claims they nabbed the database by social engineering their way into remotely connecting to a Verizon employee’s computer. The hacker’s account, in an email sent to Vice, is that they posed as internal support, coerced the Verizon employee to allow remote access, and then launched a script that copied data from the computer.
The information that was stolen could still be harmful. If you’ve ever had to get support from a carrier over the phone, you might have had to deal with the different departments that handle activating your SIM card. If a purported hacker poses as an employee and spoofed their number as one from the database, they could continue to use social engineering for SIM swapping fraud.
Over the years, attackers have utilized SIM swapping to steal bitcoin or get access to social media accounts, including that belonging to former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.
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