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Consumer Alert: Take Action if You Were Impacted By the 2021 T-Mobile Data Breach

Wednesday, March 2, 2022

(RALEIGH) Attorney General Josh Stein today asked all North Carolinians who may have been impacted by the August 2021 massive T-Mobile data breach to take steps to protect their information from identity theft. The breach impacted more than 53 million people, including 1,041,556 North Carolinians.

“If you were a T-Mobile customer last year, please take action right now to protect your financial and personal information,” said Attorney General Josh Stein. “T-Mobile’s data breach exposed more than 1 million North Carolinians’ personal data. This is unacceptable. Companies must do better protecting their customers’ information.”

On August 17, 2021, T-Mobile reported a massive data breach compromising the sensitive personal information of millions of current, former, and prospective T-Mobile customers. Among other categories of impacted information, millions had their names, dates of birth, Social Security Numbers, and driver’s license information compromised. Recently, a large subset of the information compromised in the breach was for sale on the dark web—a hidden portion of the internet where cyber criminals buy, sell, and track personal information. Many people have since received alerts through various identity theft protection services informing them that their information was found online in connection with the breach, confirming that impacted people are at heightened risk for identity theft.

If you were or think you might have been impacted by this data breach, please take these steps:

  • Monitor your credit. Credit monitoring services track your credit report and alert you whenever a change is made, such as a new account or a large purchase. Most services will notify you within 24 hours of any change to your credit report.
  • Place a free security freeze on your credit report. Identity thieves will not be able to open a new credit account in your name while the freeze is in place. You can place a credit freeze by contacting each of the three major credit bureaus:
  • Place a fraud alert on your credit report. A fraud alert tells lenders and creditors to take extra steps to verify your identity before issuing credit. You can place a fraud alert by contacting any one of the three major credit bureaus.

Additional Resources. If you believe you are a victim of identity theft, go to identitytheft.gov or https://ncdoj.gov/protecting-consumers/protecting-your-identity/ for assistance on how to report it and recover from it—or contact the North Carolina Department of Justice at 1-877-5-NO-SCAM or https://ncdoj.gov/file-a-complaint/.