Engie was the subject of a massive hack and the personal data of more than 130,000 customers find themselves in nature. This incident is believed to be the work of a hacker who wants to embarrass the energy sector company. And this is due to the increase in the price of gas in France. Engie says it already has filed a complaint and fixed the security flaw having enabled this attack. We tell you everything.
110,000 data published at Engie
Hackers no longer hesitate to attack the major players in the French economy. Pôle Emploi has already paid the price after a hacker revealed the personal data of millions of registrants.
Recently, another hacker named “HommedeLombre” targeted the energy supplier Engie. According to our colleagues at Numerama, the latter would have used the same technique as the author of hacking Pôle emploi.
In fact, HommedeLombre infiltrated the network of an external service provider in order to access confidential Engie documents. On August 23, HommedeLombre published a company database online with the personal data of more than 130,000 customers.
According to him, the hacker’s objective was to show that nothing is ever sure, “even in the most important targets”. The pirate also indicated that this operation was to respond to the increase in the price of gas in France.
To conclude his publication, the Homme de Lombre wrote amazing message :
“Strength to the hard workers, and to the French patriots! »
Engie victim of a customer data leak, 110,000 people are affected
➡️ pic.twitter.com/oJhx4ddEzx— Numerama (@Numerama) August 30, 2023
Bank details not included
In truth, this attack was only intended to embarrass Engie. However, the hacktivist has compromised the data of more than 130,000 customers, according to the Zataz alert site. Was it to apologize for this that he sent a message of support to customers?
Furthermore, the hacker stressed that, for reasons of ethics, he did not include the victims’ home addresses in the database. Engie has also suggested that the bank details were not there either.
Only first and last names, email addresses, telephone numbers and city names were shared. A company spokeswoman said Engie has filed a complaint against the hacker.
“ENGIE is filing a complaint and, in accordance with its obligations under the GDPR, will collaborate as it systematically does with the competent authorities,” she told Numerama.
The industrialist also suggested thathe will call the people concerned by this mass piracy. And to add that:
“The subject and scope of the information system in question has been put under control.”
Several data accessible on the Dark Web
Concretely, this leak comes from the Ma Prime Économie d’Energie subdomain of the official Engie website managed by an external service provider. The hacker managed to infiltrate this subdomain by exploiting a so-called n-day flaw using a system or software.
Note that a fix has already been provided for this vulnerability. Currently, the personal data of 138,608 customers registered with Engie between 2018 and 2023 are accessible on the Dark Web. What could be the consequences of this data leak?
Indeed, the fact that the hacker did not publish the addresses and bank details of customers does not remove the dangers. Victims of this leak could be the subject of phishing attempts or other forms of scams.
If this database falls into the hands of a malicious person, the latter can exploit it and pass itself off as Engie. The multinational’s customers will therefore have to be vigilant.
Engie service providers are easy targets
This new leak leads us to ask us about the security of our personal information. Especially when entrusted to this type of company. Knowing the importance of this data, it would be entirely legitimate for customers to have doubts about the reliability of their databases.
The fact that Engie has taken control of this data is reassuring. However, she must take action so that such incidents do not occur in the future. Indeed, it is not tomorrow the day before that hackers will stop attacking your personal data.
They will never stop look for exploitable vulnerabilities through these systems. Obviously, it is the external service providers who appear for the latter to be the easiest targets to reach.