O2 accused of leaking users phone numbers to websites

Today’s not a great day for UK mobile owners on the O2 network, as the operator is the latest to find itself at the heart of a data security breach.

According to multiple reports, O2 is sending-on customers phone numbers to each site they visit from their mobile browser. The issue was spotted by Lewis Peckover, who set up a small site that displays all the information he can glean from you when you visit.

“If you’re on O2′s UK mobile network (not ADSL), you’ll (probably) see a line beginning with x-up-calling-line-id – followed by your mobile phone number in plain text,” Peckover explains, which means, in simple terms, that any site you visit from a phone on O2′s data network could be grabbing your mobile number.

It’s not great news for users of O2′s partner network, GiffGaff, who are also reportedly leaking users’ priviate digits.

O2 is yet to officially comment, although in a frantic response to Twitter complaints it says: “We’re investigating this with out internal teams, and will come back with more as soon as possible”.

We’re waiting to hear back from the network, so we’ll bring you more details as soon as we get them.

[Source: TechRadar]