With the SBI investigating a suspected exposure of nearly 3,900 customer records containing personally identifiable information on the dark web, the Congress on Wednesday said the bank owes its customers answers and those responsible must be held accountable.
The opposition party's assertion comes after the State Bank of India (SBI) in a regulatory filing said a preliminary analysis of around 3.75 lakh records available on the dark web identified 3,897 customer records containing sensitive information, including registered mobile numbers, dates of birth, names, gender, email addresses and residential addresses.
The country's largest bank said it is investigating the suspected exposure of customer records containing personally identifiable information on the dark web, following alerts it received on October 16 from its threat intelligence service provider, the Defence Cyber Agency, and CERT-In.
Reacting to the development, Congress' media and publicity department head Pawan Khera said, "It is bad enough that the State Bank of India @TheOfficialSBI, the country's largest public sector bank, has suffered a data breach involving 3.75 lakh rows of data, with 3,897 records containing personally identifiable customer information -- including mobile numbers, dates of birth, names, email addresses, residential addresses, branch and CIF identifiers, lead IDs, and loan-related details."
"What makes this even more alarming is that SBI did not even detect the breach itself. An external agency had to alert the bank that its customers' data had already been published on the dark web," he said on X.
Now adding insult to injury, the SBI is yet to inform the very customers whose personal information it has failed to protect, he said.
"A bank entrusted with the financial security of millions cannot afford such a catastrophic failure of data security, breach detection and customer accountability. SBI owes its customers answers. Those responsible must be held accountable," Khera asserted.
(With inputs from PTI)
