Seoul: Police said Wednesday they have launched a formal investigation into a recent hacking incident involving SK Telecom Co., the country's largest mobile carrier, that has prompted a rush of customers seeking to replace their USIM cards or transfer to other carriers.
According to Yonhap News Agency, the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency's cyber investigation unit has formed a 22-person task force to look into the alleged cyberattack on April 18, when the carrier detected signs of a massive leak of customers' universal subscriber identity module (USIM) data.
A police official mentioned, "We have swiftly secured relevant digital evidence and activated a mutual assistance system involving domestic and foreign partners to look into the details of the hacking and its mastermind."
In response to the data leak, SK Telecom has offered free replacements of USIM chips for all of its 23 million users. The police, who had been conducting an internal probe into the case, decided to launch a formal investigation in consideration of the high level of public interest and concern it has attracted.