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Coinbase (COIN) was aware of a customer data leak at an outsourcing firm linked to a more extensive breach that could have cost up to $400 million.

 

Five former employees of the US outsourcing company TaskUs claim that at least one aspect of the breach, made public in a May 14 SEC filing, happened when an employee from India was caught using her phone to take pictures of her work computer.

Coinbase was informed right away, according to three employees and a person with knowledge of the situation. The former workers claimed that company investigators or coworkers who saw the incident in the Indian city of Indore briefed them on the situation, pointing out that the woman and a suspected accomplice provided hackers with Coinbase customer information in exchange for bribes.

Over 200 TaskUs workers were subsequently let go in a mass layoff that garnered media attention in India. Coinbase had previously attributed the breach, which it estimated could cost up to $400 million, to “support agents overseas.”.

Details of the incident, which are being reported here for the first time, raise additional questions about when Coinbase first became aware of the incident, even though the connection between TaskUs and the breach was previously claimed in a lawsuit filed last week in federal court in Manhattan.

Coinbase acknowledged that it was aware of contractors accessing employee data “without business need” in “prior months.”

The company claimed that it didn’t understand that the access was a part of a larger campaign until it received an extortion demand on May 11. Coinbase stated it had “cut ties with the TaskUs personnel involved and other overseas agents, and tightened relations” after the incident was recently discovered.