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It would be funny if it was not so serious — two men named Steven White, living in different states, have been turned into one person by Telstra.
The sharing of the same name has meant Queensland Steven was inadvertently given access to the NSW Steven's online Telstra account, which included personal information such as his phone number, address and details about his partner.
And NSW Steven knew exactly which movies Queensland Steven was watching, 1,000 kilometres away.
It started when NSW Steven, an ABC Illawarra producer, received several confusing texts about an impending Telstra National Broadband Network (NBN) installation, but he was already happy with his NBN service from another provider.
In the meantime, Queensland Steven was wondering why he was not getting any reminders at all.
Fortunately, using the information he was given for good instead of evil, Queensland Steven contacted NSW Steven to find out what was going on, and a frustrating conversation ensued.
"Hello, this is Steven White."
"Are you looking for Steven White? That's me."
"No, I'm Steven White."
"So am I."
Eventually, the two men got down to business and found their birthdates were on the same day, one year apart.
"And did you watch ET the Extra-Terrestrial on Foxtel the other day?" NSW Steven said.
"Yes! Oh my God! How did you know?" Queensland Steven said.
"They've charged my credit card for your movie," NSW Steven said.
Both Stevens have spent hours on the phone to Telstra and they said the company did not believe there are two separate people with that name.
They also claimed a case manager has been attached to the file, but they have never spoken to the person and never received a call.
Both men said they were concerned their security had been compromised.
"I was actually speaking to the [company] representative yesterday and they were trying to get their head around it," NSW Steven said.
"They assured me that Telstra has a strict verification processes in place, which I rightly pointed out has obviously failed in this case."
Queensland Steven has written to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman, and NSW Steven is about to make contact with the Australian Information Commissioner.
NSW Steven was contacted by Mark Thompson, group manager of commercial and contract operations for Telstra, who apologised and said he would make every effort to rectify the situation.
In a statement, Telstra area general manager Chris Taylor said they had spoken to both Stevens and apologised for the error.
"We are working with them to resolve the issues as quickly as possible," the statement read.
"We don't always get things right, but we are working hard to improve the experience we provide our customers. We are taking steps to retrain the relevant agent on our ID processes.
"We are committed to protecting privacy and keeping personal information safe and secure."
Topics: telecommunications, information-technology, offbeat, nowra-2541, wollongong-2500, redland-bay-4165
First posted