Singtel’s Dialog Group hit by data breach just weeks after the huge Optus breach

A hack on a second Australian company controlled by Singapore Telecommunications Ltd. exacerbated the organization’s data security crisis in the wake of the massive data breach at mobile phone operator Optus. A cybersecurity attack has been launched against The Dialog Group, an Australian IT services consulting firm that Singapore Telecommunications (Singtel) subsidiary NCS recently purchased.

NCSI Holdings Pte Ltd, a division of NCS Pte Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Singtel, purchased Dialog, an Australian IT services consulting firm, in April 2022. The systems used by Dialog are totally independent of NCS, Optus, and Singtel.

According to a Dialog statement released by SingTel on Monday, a breach on technology consultancy firm Dialog, which SingTel purchased earlier this year, may have given hackers access to information on less than 20 clients and 1,000 current and former employees. On October 7, Dialog discovered that a “very small sample” of company data, including individual employee data, had been made available on the so-called Dark Web. The actual incident happened on September 10—nearly a month earlier.

The second-largest mobile operator in Australia, Optus, experienced a significant cyberattack late last month that exposed the data of potentially 10 million customers. This led to a revision of consumer privacy laws that will make it easier for banks and telecommunications companies to share specific customer information. It said, ” On Saturday 10 September 2022, we detected unauthorised access on our servers, which were then shut down as a preventative measure. Within two business days, our servers were restored and fully operational. We contracted a leading cyber security specialist to work with our IT team to undertake a deep forensic investigation and continuous monitoring of the Dark Web. Our ongoing investigations showed no evidence of unauthorised downloading of data. On Friday 7 October 2022 we became aware that a very small sample of Dialog’s data, including some employee personal information, was published on the Dark Web. We are doing our utmost to address the situation and, as a precaution, we are actively engaging with potentially impacted stakeholders to share information, support and advice.”