Data leak at Telstra two weeks after a massive cyber attack on Optus

CTOnews.com, Oct. 4-Telstra, Australia's largest telecommunications company, said on Tuesday local time that it had suffered a small data leak, according to Reuters. Just two weeks ago, Telstra's main competitor, Optus, suffered a large-scale cyber attack.

CTOnews.com learned that Telstra has 18.8 million customer accounts, equivalent to 3/4 of Australia's population. The company said the intrusions by third-party agencies exposed some employee data dating back to 2017.

According to local media reports, Telstra said in an internal employee email that 30,000 current and former employees were affected.

A spokesman for the company said in a statement that the stolen data was "very basic" and was limited to names and email addresses. The spokesman also pointed out: "We believe that this information is now leaked in order to profit from the loophole in Optus."

Telstra did not comment on the number of people affected or the timing of the invasion, but said it only affected current and former employees.

Related readings:

"Australian operator Optus database has been leaked, and about 40% of national information has been stolen."

Australian operator Optus: network attacks affect the personal information of 1.2 million customers, not 10 million