Mumbai: State Bank of India (SBI) is investigating a suspected data breach after around 375,000 records surfaced on the dark web. This is the latest cyber incident to hit the financial sector at a time when India’s cybersecurity agency has warned that attackers are increasingly using artificial intelligence to penetrate financial institutions.
The bank was alerted on October 16 by its threat-intelligence service provider, the Defence Cyber Agency and the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) about the suspected exposure of customer data, the lender said in an exchange filing.
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SBI said it immediately activated its cyber-incident response and containment protocols and engaged an independent CERT-In-empanelled cybersecurity agency to investigate the nature and extent of the suspected compromise. “A detailed investigation was required to establish the authenticity and completeness of the exposed data, determine the potential source and extent of the exposure, and assess the associated risks to customers and the Bank,” SBI said on Wednesday.
SBI said preliminary analysis of approximately 375,000 records available on the dark web identified 3,897 customer records containing personally identifiable information (PII).
The exposed information reportedly included registered mobile numbers, dates of birth, names, gender, email and residential addresses, branch and customer information file (CIF) identifiers, lead IDs and metadata associated with loan and lead records.
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The lender said the incident has not had any material impact on its core business operations, financial performance or business continuity, with operations continuing normally.
