SaskTel Notifies Customers about Security Breach

Telecommunications corporation SaskTel has said that within its network, one computer that stored customer data for e-mail distribution had contacted a viral infection.

But according to the company, the infected files did not have customers' personal information. The Crown-owned telecom corporation also said the malware had not infected any of its customers.

Director of corporate affairs Darcel MacFarlane for SaskTel said that the system infection occurred in the third week of November 2007 when an employee accidentally downloaded certain file carrying the malware onto the computer that held the company's distribution lists. The StarPhoenix published this in news on November 22, 2007.

Although part of the client information including names, addresses, phone numbers and e-mail addresses was on the list, it did not have any birth date, social insurance numbers and account information of the customers, MacFarlane said.

According to MacFarlane, the company's security team put the computer under forensic investigation to determine the sort of information breached and found that 89% of it was only e-mail addresses.

The customer data that got exposed was categorized into groups on the basis of the volume of information entered per customer. The categories were: 7% comprising of name and one corresponding email address, 3% comprising of name, phone number, address and e-mail address and 2% comprising of name, e-mail address and postal address.

In another statement that The Canada Press published on November 22 2007, MacFarlane said that the company was not aware if there had been an access to the information although a possibility exists.

If miscreants used customer information from the list, it could mean that spam mails would increase. To that respect, MacFarlane is advising customers to update their filters and e-mail security. She also recommends them not to open an e-mail they suspect, avoid downloading attachments that come from un-trusted sources, and make sure their computers have the latest patches and software installed.

MacFarlane said that SaskTel was not sending any e-mail to its customers to avoid the malware from spreading. She said that a release was distributed to customers to notify them about the mishap. She further added that the virus came from a foreign land.

Related article: SaskTel Warns Customers of phishing E-Mail

» SPAMfighter News - 12/5/2007