The almost 77 million customers who were impacted by the T-Mobile breach last year could be receiving some money. The corporation just disclosed the settlement terms in a consolidated class action lawsuit, and they are pricey: $350 million to be divided among consumers (and attorneys), plus $150 million “for data security and related technologies.” Let this serve as a lesson to all businesses: You don’t need to spend $150 million to get ready if you stay prepared!
After the hack, which allegedly happened at the beginning of last year, collections of T-Mobile user data were offered for sale on several dark web marketplaces. According to T-Mobile, less than a million accounts and PINs were entirely exposed, which is still not good, and between 40 and 100 million subscribers had part of their data stolen overall.
Although it doesn’t appear that the settlement had varied conditions for those who were affected differently by the incident, which may have been handled independently for all we know. It is disclosed in an SEC filing and court file (PDF), which were originally reported by Geekwire.
For the time being, the settlement document’s definition of the class is “the roughly 76.6 million U.S. persons identified by T-Mobile whose information was stolen in the Data Breach,” with some added legalese for Californians as class actions there are handled a bit differently.
You probably won’t even be able to cover a single monthly mobile bill with what you get, but in today’s society, a $9 check could mean the difference between “dinner” and “no dinner” for many people, so let’s not laugh at these small amounts. However, it is insulting that after five serious breaches in as many years, all customers receive is enough to order from the value menu.
The organization, which merged with Sprint shortly before the incident, stated in its SEC filing that it will be investing $150 million in enhancing its security, suggesting that it may now be taking the situation seriously. Guess we’ll learn soon enough.
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