Missouri attorney general warns consumers impacted by the 2021 T-Mobile data breach to protect themselves

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (KMIZ)

The Missouri attorney general is urging residents to take proactive steps to protect their information from identity theft if they think they might have been impacted by the August 2021 T-Mobile data breach.

Last year, T-Mobile reported a data breach that compromised over 800,000 Missouri residents' sensitive personal information including names, dates of birth, Social Security Numbers, and driver’s license information.
 
Recently, a large subset of the information compromised in the breach was discovered for sale on the dark web.

Attorney General Eric Schmitt urges anyone who believes they were impacted by the T-Mobile breach to take the following steps to protect themselves:

Monitor your credit. Credit monitoring services track your credit report and alert you whenever a change is made, such as a new account or a large purchase. Most services will notify you within 24 hours of any change to your credit report.  

Consider placing a free credit freeze on your credit report. Identity thieves will not be able to open a new credit account in your name while the freeze is in place. You can place a credit freeze by contacting each of the three major credit bureaus:

Equifax | 1 (888) 766-0008

Experian | 1 (888) 397-3742

TransUnion | 1 (800) 680-7289

Place a fraud alert on your credit report. A fraud alert tells lenders and creditors to take extra steps to verify your identity before issuing credit. You can place a fraud alert by contacting any one of the three major credit bureaus.