Federman & Sherwood, a boutique litigation law firm based in Oklahoma City, announced Friday it has filed the first class-action lawsuit against American cable provider Altice. The move comes as a response to the recent security breach that impacted Altice and led to the exposure of personal information belonging to thousands of its current and former employees.
Earlier this month, the N.Y.-based cable operator disclosed a data breach that impacted the email account of its employees. According to a press release, the breach happened in November last year, when an “unauthorized third party” used a phishing email campaign to gain access to the email account credentials of its employees. With the stolen credentials, the attackers were able to access and download the contents of mailboxes.
Among the personal data exposed to the breach included the names, employment information, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, and some drivers’ license numbers of about 12,000 current employees and some former employees.
“During our investigation, we learned in January 2020 that certain downloaded mailboxes contained password-protected reports that included personal information for current employees and some former employees," said Lisa Anselmo, spokesperson of Altice. "A limited number of customers were also included.”
When asked by Newsday how many customers were impacted by the incident, the cable provider failed to provide a response. However, as provided in the company’s securities filings in December 2018, nearly 5 million residential and business customers are currently under the care of Altice, Newsday reported.
February 12, litigation law firm Federman & Sherwood announced it will be initiating an investigation concerning the recent security incident.
“In November 2019, multiple Altice employees fell victim to a phishing email campaign, resulting in criminal actors gaining access to employee email accounts. The compromised accounts contained significant amounts of sensitive personal information belonging to current and former employees and possibly some customers as well,” the law firm recounted.
“Altice began notifying affected individuals in February 2020. The personal information compromised by Altice in this data breach will expose breach victims to identity theft and other forms of fraud.”
In response to the data breach, Colleen Schmidt, Altice’s executive vice president of human resources, said that the cable company will be offering free identification and credit monitoring for affected customers through the help of Experian, a leading global consumer credit reporting company.
“If you have information about this data breach, want to discuss this data breach, obtain further information or participate in potential litigation, or have any questions or concerns regarding this notice, please contact Tiffany Peintner at trp@federmanlaw.com or visit our firm’s website at www.federmanlaw.com.,” concluded Federman & Sherwood.
