A judge in Texas has granted preliminary approval for a deal that will grant a $177 million total settlement to address two recent AT&T data breaches.
According to reporting from PCMag, eligible customers will receive notifications this summer via email or physical letter from the settlement administrator. Ideally, the funds will be distributed before the final approval hearing on December 3rd.
As a result of that breach, threat actors had access to the personal information including names, Social Security numbers, and birth dates of 51 million former and existing customers. AT&T confirmed the breach only this past March; several class action lawsuits followed accusing the company that it hadn’t properly safeguarded the stolen data.
The second data breach involved AT&T’s account with Snowflake, a cloud storage provider, and a hacker that gained unauthorized access during April of 2024.
The hacker responsible for the breach obtained call and text records for almost all of AT&T’s customers; though AT&T claims no customer names were included in the exposed information. Additional class action lawsuits alleging corporate neglect followed. Law enforcement did arrest two individuals alleged to be involved in the Snowflake breach though.
AT&T has said in a statement that it has “agreed to this settlement to avoid the expense and uncertainty of protracted litigation,” but the company denies the allegations in the lawsuits that suggest it was responsible for any criminals acts.
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