The probe into last week's TalkTalk hack has yielded a 15-year old suspect. In a joint effort between the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) and the Metropolitan Police Cyber Crime Unit (MPCCU), a house in County Antrim was raided and the boy taken into custody. He is suspected of violating the Computer Misuse Act, BBC reported.
Last week, a "significant and sustained cyber-attack" was revealed by the internet provider. The ISP, which has a solid four million customers in the UK, said that banking details and personal information had been illegally accessed.
However, TalkTalk has said in statements after the criminal investigation was launched last Thursday that the attack had been "materially lower" than initially feared, The Guardian noted.
For instance, it was feared that credit card details were swiped by the hacker. It has since been cleared up that most of the card details were deemed useless as they mostly came up as x's instead of the actual digits. Other personal data like names and addresses, however, were unencrypted and could have been copied by the attacker.
Business leaders have since called for swift action over cyber crimes. MP's will also be launching an inquiry over the hack which exploited TalkTalk's vulnerabilities. Culture minister Ed Vaizey also told the House of Commons that the government is not against the idea of compulsory encryption of customer data, The Register reported.
The latest TalkTalk scandal is being closely watched by many groups. One reason for this is the possible liability of the company for allowing such a breach to happen.
In 2014, a sophisticated and systematic scam involving calls to customers and quoting their bank account details to gain trust was reported by TalkTalk customers. Their bank accounts were then emptied out. Up to this day, the company refuses to compensate the victims as their financial information was never leaked.
