The American telecom mobile communications subsidiary T-Mobile US has had to pay a fine of 60 million dollars (about 55 million euros) due to data security problems. According to Cepheus, the agency that oversees foreign investment in the United States, between August 2020 and June 2021, T-Mobile US in some cases allowed unauthorized access to sensitive data and did not take appropriate measures to protect it.
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According to the company, a “small number” of inquiries from investigating authorities were affected. Due to technical problems following Sprint’s acquisition, the data was further redacted. The information was only accessible to internal US security officials.
It is unusual for Cfius (Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States) to name the company that has been fined. This is also the authority’s largest punishment to date. It was imposed this year. The exact timing was not mentioned at the time of publication. Cepheus also pointed this outT-Mobile US did not immediately report some of the violations, which is another violation of the agreement. T-Mobile is now working on improving its compliance programs and is collaborating with Cepheus.
In a statement, T-Mobile spoke of technical problems during its merger with the American mobile phone company Sprint. The problem was quickly resolved. The Deutsche Telekom subsidiary acquired Sprint in 2020. In 2023, consumers filed suit as a result of the merger because two major competitors, Verizon and AT&T, raised their prices. Accordingly, the merger was unacceptable under antitrust law.
Just earlier in the year, the US regulatory authority FCC levied a fine of 80 million against T-Mobile US for selling location data – AT&T and Verizon received further fines. In 2021, cybercriminals obtained personal information due to a security vulnerability. This affected the personal data of more than 50 million current and former customers.
(Mac)
