Customer looking to preorder iPhone in Singapore finds security loophole instead

(Update on September 16: In a Facebook post, M1 has announced that the potential security breach has been rectified, and preorders will resume. The post is embedded below)

Demand for Apple’s iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus is currently at an all-time high, with the number of preorders globally hitting an incredible four million within twenty-four hours – two times higher than the iPhone 5 just a year before. Among the chaos in Singapore, though, a potential security breach has surfaced, causing local telco M1 to halt pre-orders temporarily, according to Channel NewsAsia. They announced this in a Facebook post on Monday, September 15, prompting understandably irate responses from netizens:

Using a cookie modifier plugin on Google Chrome, a member of the public – a Computer Science masters student, no less – told Channel NewsAsia that he had managed to access forms showing data from customers while trying to get a new iPhone himself. According to the report, sensitive information such as phone numbers, NRIC and home addresses were revealed.

He adds that, in just a matter of hours, any sophisticated hacker would be able to download the whole database.

M1’s website is currently under maintenance, presumably in response to this loophole. We have reached out to M1, and will update this article as soon as there are any updates.

See: Apple’s big reveal recap: the Apple Watch, two iPhone 6 flavors, and Apple Pay