> A person with insider knowledge stole data including names, addresses, birth dates, and bank account information, the world’s second-biggest mobile-phone carrier said in a statement today.<p>Am I correct in understanding that the data stolen is Vodafone's customer payment details (ex: for auto payments)? At first read I thought that Vodafone had gotten into banking but I don't think that makes sense.<p>> The hacker had no access to credit-card information, passwords, PIN numbers or mobile-phone numbers, Vodafone said.<p>Credit card numbers and passwords I can understand as not being accessible (both can be either escrowed or hashed) but I don't see how it's possible to not have access to mobile phone numbers. If Vodafone is anything like US carriers then your phone number is basically your account number (sometimes a couple extra digits, ususally nothing though). Does anyone really think they have a separate account # per customer with the just the above data referenced to it?