Disclosure context

About thegentlemen

thegentlemen is a ransomware group that emerged in September 2025, operating with apparent financial motivations based on their broad targeting of commercial sectors. The group has documented 267 victims across multiple countries, with primary focus on the United States, Thailand, France, Brazil, and India. Their targeting strategy demonstrates a preference for high-value sectors including manufacturing, technology, healthcare, and financial services organizations. Given the group's recent emergence and limited public documentation from established threat intelligence sources such as CISA, FBI, or major security research firms, specific details regarding their country of origin, operational structure, attack methodologies, encryption techniques, and whether they employ ransomware-as-a-service models remain unclear. The relatively high victim count of 267 in a short operational timeframe since September 2025 suggests either an aggressive campaign pace or potential inflation of victim numbers through affiliate operations, though without corroborating intelligence reports, the group's exact operational capabilities and notable campaigns cannot be definitively established. Current intelligence indicates the group remains active as of late 2025, though comprehensive threat profiling requires additional validated reporting from authoritative cybersecurity sources. The group has been linked to 424 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on September 9, 2025; most recent post May 18, 2026. The operation is currently active.

Also tracked as: the gentlemen.

Timeline of this disclosure

May 9, 2026TDS listed by thegentlemenon the group's public leak site

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Telecommunication sector, which has 54 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, TDS is reported in US, a country with 2,713 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

How we know this. Darkfield monitors public ransomware leak sites continuously, archiving every new disclosure and the data later released against the victim. Each entry on this page is sourced from the operator's own publication and cross-checked against complementary OSINT feeds (RansomLook, ransomware.live, RansomWatch). We do not collect or host stolen data — only the metadata, timestamps and screenshots needed to make the public disclosure searchable and accountable. Records here are corrected when the original post is edited, retracted, or merged with another disclosure.

Ransomware victim disclosure

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TDS

Claimed by thegentlemen · listed 12 days ago

11d

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

Listed
May 9, 2026
Data leaked

At a glance

Group: thegentlemen
Status: Data leaked
Country: US
Sector: Telecommunication
Listed on leak site: May 9, 2026

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

TDS Telecommunications LLC is a wholly owned subsidiary of Telephone and Data Systems, Inc. (NYSE: TDS), headquartered in Madison, Wisconsin, founded in 1969. The company provides high-speed fiber-optic internet (up to 8 Gbps), IP-based TV, home phone, and mobile services to residential and business customers across urban, suburban, and rural U.S. communities. With over 1.1 million connections, TDS also offers business solutions including VoIP, dedicated internet, and data networking.

Industry: Telecommunications Services (Residential & Business ISP/TV/Phone)
Address: 525 Junction Road, Madison, Wisconsin 53717, US
Employees: 1000-5000
Founded: 1969

Attack summary

Severity: critical — TDS is a major U.S. telecommunications provider with over 1.1 million connections; data publication by the threat actor strongly implies exfiltration of regulated PII at scale (residential and business customer records, potentially including financial/billing data), which meets the critical threshold.

The group 'thegentlemen' claims to have compromised TDS Telecommunications LLC and has published data, as indicated by the 'data_published' disclosed status. The specific nature of the exfiltrated data and whether encryption occurred is not detailed in the leak post.

critical

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Customer PII (residential and business)
Account and billing records
Business customer data
Internal network/telecommunications infrastructure data
Employee records

What the group claims

tdstelecom.com TDS Telecommunications LLC, founded in 1969 and headquartered in Madison, Wisconsin, is a leading U.S. telecommunications provider serving residential and business customers across urban, suburban, and rural communities. The company delivers high-speed fiber-optic internet (up to 8 Gigabit), IP-based TV entertainment, and traditional phone services, alongside business solutions like VoIP, dedicated internet, and data networking. With over 1.1 million connections, TDS is a wholly owned subsidiary of Telephone and Data Systems, Inc. (NYSE: TDS), committed to enhancing communities through reliable, innovative communications technology.

Sources

Victim sitetdstelecom.com

Source

Indexed 12 days ago

This page surfaces a public ransomware disclosure indexed by Darkfield. Original posts come from the operator's own leak site; we cross-check against ransomware.live, RansomLook and RansomWatch where applicable. Share this URL freely.