AT&T says hackers stole call and text records of ‘nearly all’ customers in 2022 thumbnail

AT&T says hackers stole call and text records of ‘nearly all’ customers in 2022

Hackers accessed the call and text message records of “nearly all” of AT&T’s customers between May 1, 2022, and Oct. 31, 2022, the company said Friday.

AT&T said it learned in April the data was illegally downloaded from the company’s workspace on a third-party cloud platform.

The compromised data includes files containing call and text records of nearly all of AT&T’s cellular customers, wireless network customers, and landline customers over the six-month period in 2022, as well as records from Jan. 2, 2023, for a small number of customers, the company said. 

The records identify the telephone numbers an AT&T cellular number interacted with during those time periods. They do not contain the content of calls or texts, personally identifiable information such as Social Security numbers or dates of birth, or the timestamps of calls and texts.

The company warned that although the data does not include the names of customers, there are ways to find the name linked to a telephone number using publicly available online tools.

“At this time, we do not believe that the data is publicly available,” it added.

AT&T said it launched an investigation and is working with law enforcement to arrest those involved in the incident.

“We understand that at least one person has been apprehended,” AT&T said.

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The company said in an SEC filing that it has taken additional cybersecurity measures in response to the data breach, including closing off the illegal access point. It will provide notice to its current and former affected customers. 

“As of the date of this filing, this incident has not had a material impact on AT&T’s operations, and AT&T does not believe that this incident is reasonably likely to materially impact AT&T’s financial condition or results of operations,” the company said.

Automatic doors now operating on all Metrorail lines thumbnail

Automatic doors now operating on all Metrorail lines

Automatic doors are now operating on all Metrorail lines, cutting wait times for Washington, D.C.-area commuters by up to 10 seconds per stop.

Train doors will now open automatically 3-5 seconds after the train stops on the station platform, according to a Monday Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority press release. 

Previously, the train operator would have to open their window, stick their head out to verify the doors were opening on the correct side, and then press a button to open the doors — a process that took up to 15 seconds.

“Anyone who uses Metrorail has experienced the wait, standing at the door wondering when the doors will open,” Brian Dwyer, WMATA’s chief operations officer, said in October.

WMATA previously launched automatic doors on the Red Line in December, and on Monday, it was approved to fully operate them on the Blue, Green, Orange, Silver, and Yellow lines after weeks of certifying that operators could use the technology. The changes went into effect on Monday.

“Auto Doors on the Red Line has been very successful with more than 1.3 million safe door openings since launching last year,” WMATA’s CEO Randy Clarke said in a statement. “With Auto Doors, we’ve achieved better schedule consistency and now we’re excited to bring this safety and convenience improvement to all our customers.”

The automatic doors will improve safety as well as efficiency, WMATA said. The technology is meant to eliminate human error and reduce the risk of the train doors opening on the wrong side. Operators will still close the doors manually upon departure to ensure that all passengers have safely entered and exited the train.

The Washington Metro originally used an automatic train operating system, including automatic doors, when it first opened in 1976. That changed in 2009 when two Red Line trains collided due to a faulty track sensor, killing nine and injuring at least 80.

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Metro announced a plan last year to gradually automate portions of the rail system again. The automatic doors are the first step in that process.

“While restoring a previous feature, Auto Doors marks a technological milestone for Metro’s modernization initiatives,” WMATA’s website says.

Covenant shooter writings won’t be released to public, judge rules thumbnail

Covenant shooter writings won’t be released to public, judge rules

A Tennessee judge ruled Thursday that the writings of the Covenant School shooter will not be made public.

“When there is a pending or contemplated criminal investigation, Tennessee courts have determined that unfettered access to every record at any time does not serve to uphold the system of justice that we all depend upon to ensure that the criminal legal system and investigations remain fair and impartial for every involved person,” Judge I’Ashea Myles of Davidson County Chancery Court wrote in her ruling.

“Therefore, the right to unencumbered access to public records was tempered by certain exceptions which serve to keep certain information from disclosure as the risk of harm from disclosure is outweighed by the public’s right to know,” she added.

The ruling comes a year after the parents of Covenant shooter Audrey Hale transferred legal ownership of the writings to the parents of Covenant students, who argued the writings were protected under copyright law.

In her decision, Myles said releasing Hale’s writings, journals, art, photos, and videos “would violate and conflict with the exclusive federal rights granted to copyright owners.”

Hale, who killed three 9-year-olds and three adults in March 2023 at the Christian school in Nashville, left behind at least 20 journals, a suicide note, and a memoir, the Associated Press reported.

Several groups sued for the release of the materials in the wake of the shooting, including a Tennessee gun rights group, state media outlets, the National Police Association, and Tennessee state Sen. Todd Gardenhire, a Republican.

“We keep hearing this phrase, ‘We don’t want someone speaking from the grave,” Douglas R. Pierce, a lawyer for the National Police Association, said in April. He added that Hale “is not going to do anything to anyone else now, but we can learn valuable lessons from those documents.”

Covenant families argued that the release of the materials could traumatize the families of the victims and lead to copycat crimes — which Myles called a matter “of grave concern.”

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Some of Hale’s writings were leaked to conservative commentator Steven Crowder last year. Last month, the Tennessee Star, one of the parties who filed suit, published several more writings.

The ruling is likely to be appealed.

Carlo Acutis to become Catholic Church’s first millennial saint thumbnail

Carlo Acutis to become Catholic Church’s first millennial saint

Carlo Acutis, the late computer-programming Italian teenager known as “God’s Influencer,” will become the Catholic Church’s first millennial saint.

Pope Francis and the College of Cardinals approved Acutis’s canonization on Monday, the Vatican News announced. He will likely be proclaimed a saint during the 2025 Jubilee.

Acutis, a devout Catholic, was born in London in 1991 and was a talented computer programmer and graphic designer from a young age. He designed a website cataloging more than 150 Eucharistic miracles around the world, which has gone on to be displayed at thousands of parishes across five continents, the Catholic News Agency reported.

“Computer genius, Carlo made his computer an instrument at the service of God and the Internet a way to evangelize, spreading his love for the Holy Eucharist,” the website of the 2023 World Youth Day in Lisbon, Portugal, said.

Before becoming a saint in the Catholic Church, a person must first be declared “venerable” and then beatified or declared “blessed.”

Acutis was declared venerable by Francis in 2018, a recognition that he had lived a life of “heroic virtue.”

Beatification, the next step in the process of sainthood, requires a miracle to have been attributed to a person. Acutis was beatified in 2020 after reportedly healing a young Brazilian boy from a birth defect affecting his pancreas in 2013, seven years after Acutis’s death.

Francis attributed a second miracle to Acutis in May, clearing the way for his canonization. Acutis reportedly healed a young woman suffering from a head injury as a result of a bicycle accident in 2022 after the woman’s mother prayed for her recovery at the late teenager’s tomb in Assisi, Italy.

Acutis’s mother, Antonia Salzano, described her son as a “sign of hope” to CNN in May.

“[With] all the media, the technologies, it seems sometimes that holiness is something that belongs to the past,” she said. “Instead, holiness is also something nowadays in this modern time.”

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Acutis loved playing video games such as Halo, Super Mario, and Pokemon, CNN reported.

He died of acute promyelocytic leukemia in 2006 at 15 years old.