Orange, a French telecommunications giant and a leading global operator, announced the detection of a cyberattack that impacted one of its critical information systems last Friday. The breach was discovered and isolated on July 25 by Orange Cyberdefense, the company’s cybersecurity unit. As a result, several operational disruptions occurred, primarily affecting customers in France, which are anticipated to be resolved by Wednesday morning, July 30.
In a statement, Orange confirmed, “On Friday, July 25, the Orange Group detected a cyberattack on one of its information systems. Immediately alerted, with the support of Orange Cyberdefense, the teams mobilized fully to isolate the potentially affected services and limit the impact.” However, the isolation efforts have led to disruptions of certain services for both business and consumer customers, mainly in France.
Since the incident, Orange has taken steps to alert authorities and has filed a complaint regarding the breach. The company has reassured customers that, at this stage in the investigation, there is no evidence suggesting that any data has been stolen during the attack. Orange stated, “We remain vigilant in this regard.” Nonetheless, the company has not named any specific hacking group associated with the attack that bears similarities to the widespread breaches involving telecom providers globally, often linked to the Chinese Salt Typhoon cyber-espionage group.
This incident recalls recent confirmation by the FBI and CISA, which in October mentioned that Chinese state hackers had breached multiple telecom providers across the US and beyond. Reports indicate that various telecom companies in several countries have been targeted by the Salt Typhoon group in previous attacks. This includes notable cases where Comcast, Digital Realty, and Viasat have also reported breaches attributed to this threat actor.
Furthermore, this latest cyberattack comes after Orange’s Romanian branch faced a similar incident in February. During that breach, a threat actor under the alias ‘Rey’ claimed responsibility for stealing thousands of sensitive documents, including internal data and employee information. As a major telecommunications provider, Orange serves 294 million customers worldwide, with a comprehensive portfolio of services that includes mobile and fixed broadband.