The attack means that millions of Bouygues Telecom customers are impacted, with the company sharing that the incident enabled hackers to access the personal information on 6.4 million customer accounts.

Bouygues Telecom shared that it first detected the cyberattack on 4 August.

“After analysis, it appears that a third party was able to access personal information associated with certain Bouygues Telecom subscriptions,” the company said in a statement on its website. “All the customers concerned have received or will receive an email or SMS to inform them.

“Our technical teams have put in place actions to put an end to this attack as quickly as possible and have taken the necessary additional measures to strengthen the security of our information system.”

Bouygues Telecom says the details involved in the breach are contact details, contractual data, civil status data or company data and IBANs (International Bank Account Numbers). It says that credit card numbers and passwords are not affected.

The cyberattack has been reported to CNIL, the data protection agency in France.

This news comes very shortly after another French telecom giant, Orange, experienced a cyberattack. The attack took place on Friday 25 July and impacted one of the company’s internal systems, with the group detecting a cyberattack on its information systems.

In a statement, Orange said: “At this stage of the investigation, there is no evidence to suggest that any customer or Orange data has been extracted. We remain vigilant in this regard.”

Telecoms companies could be targeted by cybercriminals for a number of reasons, given how important their infrastructure is around the world. Additionally, the industry handles vast amounts of sensitive and private information and their networks continue to be very interconnected.

Threat actors could have a lot to gain in this regard from a data breach. With technologies like AI and 5G being more in demand, the telecommunications landscape has become more complex – meaning that cybersecurity must become more robust.

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