Orange warns of possible mobile disruption following suspected cyberattack

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Orange forced to suspend some of its services

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(Image credit: Orange)
  • Orange warns customers of an ongoing cyberattack
  • The attack forced it to isolate parts of its network
  • This isolation could cause disruptions, it warned

Orange Group, one of the world’s leading telecom operators, has warned about a cyberattack that disrupted some of its services.

In a statement, the French telecom giant said on July 25, it detected a cyberattack on one of its information systems. Moving in to mitigate the threat, the company was forced to “isolate” potentially affected services, causing disruption to different management services and platforms.

Both business customers, as well as “a few” consumer services, primarily located in France, could experience temporary service disruptions or be completely offline for some users, Orange said. “Our dedicated teams are actively engaged in informing and assisting the affected customers.”

Salt Typhoon

The company said it identified and is currently implementing solutions that will allow it to gradually restore the affected services. At press time, most of the services should already be back up and running.

While there was no talk of the threat actors, how they broke in, or what their motives were, Orange did say that there was no evidence suggesting any data exfiltration or tampering. However, it still lodged a formal complaint with the regulators and filed notices with relevant authorities.

“For obvious security reasons, Orange will not provide further comments,” Orange concluded.

Being critical infrastructure, telecommunications organizations are constantly at the crosshairs of different hacking groups and state-sponsored cybercriminals.

Salt Typhoon, a Chinese state-sponsored group and a part of the wider “typhoon” collective of hackers, has been targeting telecoms for some time, striking some of the world’s biggest and most popular brands.

The goal is to remain hidden inside the network, in case tensions between China and the US over Taiwan escalate into a full-blown war. In that case, the groups are tasked with disrupting services, eavesdropping on vital communications, and exfiltrating sensitive information.

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Sead Fadilpašić

Sead is a seasoned freelance journalist based in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. He writes about IT (cloud, IoT, 5G, VPN) and cybersecurity (ransomware, data breaches, laws and regulations). In his career, spanning more than a decade, he’s written for numerous media outlets, including Al Jazeera Balkans. He’s also held several modules on content writing for Represent Communications.

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