Eurobites: 3 UK Suffers Major Data Breach

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: MTS revenue down in Q3; Russia freezes out LinkedIn; drawing the 5G map; Sky looks beyond sport.

Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe

November 18, 2016

3 Min Read
Eurobites: 3 UK Suffers Major Data Breach

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: MTS revenue down in Q3; Russia freezes out LinkedIn; drawing the 5G map; Sky looks beyond sport.

  • UK mobile operator Three UK has become the latest victim of a major telco data security breach, with one its databases, containing the details of up to 6 million customers, being hacked via an employee login, the Daily Telegraph reports. It seems the hackers used the information from the database to order device upgrades for certain eligible customers and then somehow intercepted the devices at the point of delivery, possibly to sell them on. Three people have been arrested in connection with the breach, two for "computer misuse" and one for perverting the course of justice.

    Commenting on the case, Heavy Reading Chief Analyst Patrick Donegan said: "There are two lessons from this attack and many others like them. The first one is timeless. Usernames and passwords have to be replaced with more accurate and reliable authentication leveraging biometrics and user behavior analytics. The second is only starting to gather momentum. Businesses -- whether in the telecom or other sectors -- need to have a clear plan and response resources to draw upon for when they suffer a serious security breach." Donegan is hosting the Service Provider & Enterprise Security Strategies 2016 event in New York on December 1. (See Polymorphic Attacks Reshape Security Landscape.)

    • Russian operator Mobile TeleSystems OJSC (MTS) (NYSE: MBT) saw third-quarter revenue slip by 1.3% year-on-year to 112.2 billion Russian rubles (US$1.73 billion) and net profit slide 12.8% to RUB12.6 billion ($195 million). In a statement, CEO Andrei Duboskov blamed the decline on "macroeconomic factors and competitive issues," but claimed that MTS's revenue had remained stable in comparison to that of its rivals.

    • Russia's decision to block access to LinkedIn, the professionals' networking site, has left the US government "deeply concerned," according to a Reuters report. Russia cut the line to LinkedIn because of a new law that requires the data of Russian citizens to be stored in Russia. LinkedIn has more than 6 million registered users in Russia.

    • UK mapping company Ordnance Survey has been chosen to develop a planning tool to help with the rollout of 5G, leading a consortium that will build a "digital twin" of the real world to determine the best locations for the radio antennae necessary for a 5G network. The tool will be trialed on Bournemouth, the town on the English south coast that used to be best known as a seaside resort but is morphing into something of a tech hub.

    • Pay-TV giant Sky is falling out of love with expensive sports rights and turning its attentions to other forms of content, according to a Bloomberg report. CEO Jeremy Darroch told a conference in Barcelona: "Sport is very important, obviously football is very important, but relatively, every day it is less important than it was and that allows us to make more choices about how much we spend, where we invest and where we choose not to." It seems young viewers are changing their viewing habits, and are less inclined to "commit" to watching a whole game, being more likely to dip in and out via various smartphone platforms.

    • Telefónica has been chosen by the coffee division of food and drinks giant Nestlé as the supplier of its IoT platform. Apparently, Nestlé will be able to use Telefónica's Smart m2m Solution to optimize the "end user experience," including being able to "adjust the coffee taste." Sounds like one for our "esteamed" (geddit?!) arabica-bean-crazed editor-in-chief. Figure 1: Mr Bean But not the stuff sold by Nestle. But not the stuff sold by Nestlé.

      — Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

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About the Author

Paul Rainford

Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

Paul is based on the Isle of Wight, a rocky outcrop off the English coast that is home only to a colony of technology journalists and several thousand puffins.

He has worked as a writer and copy editor since the age of William Caxton, covering the design industry, D-list celebs, tourism and much, much more.

During the noughties Paul took time out from his page proofs and marker pens to run a small hotel with his other half in the wilds of Exmoor. There he developed a range of skills including carrying cooked breakfasts, lying to unwanted guests and stopping leaks with old towels.

Now back, slightly befuddled, in the world of online journalism, Paul is thoroughly engaged with the modern world, regularly firing up his VHS video recorder and accidentally sending text messages to strangers using a chipped Nokia feature phone.

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