The details of 10,000 Optus customers have been released, with threats to release the same number each day until a ransom of $1.5 million was paid.
The details included passport numbers, driving licence numbers, dates of birth, home addresses, and full names.
The hacker wrote: “Optus if you wish to contact, message onsite! We are businessmen US$1 million is lot of money and will keep too our word. If you care about customer you will pay! Revenue 9B$ dollar, 1M$US small price to pay!
“If 1.000.000$US pay then data will be deleted from drive. Only 1 copy exist. Will not sale data too. Completely gone!”
“4 more day to decide Optus!
“Since they not payed yet here is 10.000 record from address file. Will release 10.000 record every day for 4 day when they not pay.”
This gives Optus until Friday to pay the ransom – an unlikely scenario.
Meanwhile, “tens of thousands” of Australians have already showed interest in a class action suit floated yesterday by Slater and Gordon.
“When you contract with a provider like Optus and provide them with confidential information, particularly identity information, consumers have a right to believe the provider will take steps to secure that information and ensure that it can’t be accessed,” Slater and Gordon’s class action senior associate Ben Zocco told ABC RN Breakfast.
Zocco called the release of the 10,000 customers’ details “particularly concerning” given the 9.8 million Australians impacted.
