Over $97M fine imposed on SK Telecom after significant hack

Major South Korean telecommunications provider SK Telecom has been ordered to pay a record fine of $97.2 million for an April cyberattack that compromised more than 23 million mobile users' SIM card details, The Korea Herald reports. Other negligent practices have prompted nearly $7,000 in penalties from South Korea's Personal Information Protection Commission. "SKT had linked its internet, management and internal networks on the same system without restricting external access to its internal management servers. The management servers were unnecessarily connected to the Home Subscriber Server, where the breach occurred, allowing hackers to reach the HSS and extract data," said the PIPC. While being the highest on record so far, such a fine was significantly lower than the over $250 million penalty initially suggested for SK Telecom. Additional review of the ruling will be conducted by SK Telecom, which said that the decision of the PIPC did not adequately reflect the efforts it has made in the aftermath of the intrusion.