Pierluigi Paganini January 04, 2018

A privacy incident suffered by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) exposed data related to 247,167 current and former federal employees.

A data breach suffered by the Department of Homeland Security exposed data related to 247,167 current and former federal employees that were employed by the Agency in 2014.

The data breach affected a database used by the DHS Office of the Inspector General (OIG) that was stored in the Department of Homeland Security OIG Case Management System.

“On January 3, 2018, select DHS employees received notification letters that they may have been impacted by a privacy incident related to the DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) Case Management System.  The privacy incident did not stem from a cyber-attack by external actors, and the evidence indicates that affected individual’s personal information was not the primary target of the unauthorized transfer of data.” reads the announcement published by the DHS.

Exposed data includes employee names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, positions, grades, and duty stations.

The incident also affected a second group of individuals (i.e., subjects, witnesses, and complainants) associated with Department of Homeland Security OIG investigations from 2002 through 2014 (the “Investigative Data”).

The data leak was the result of an unauthorized copy of the DHS OIG investigative case management system that was in the possession of a former DHS OIG employee.

The copy was discovered as part of an ongoing criminal investigation being conducted by Department of Homeland Security OIG and the U.S. Attorney’s Office

The data breach was discovered on May 10, 2017, as part of an ongoing criminal investigation conducted by OIG and the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

The Department of Homeland Security sent notification letters to affected individuals, it is also implementing additional security measured to limit access to such kind of information.

All individuals potentially affected by the incident are being offered 18 months of free credit monitoring and identity protection services.

“Department of Homeland Security is implementing additional security precautions to limit which individuals have access to this information and will better identify unusual access patterns. ” continues the Department of Homeland Security.

“We will continue to review our systems and practices in order to better secure data. DHS OIG has also implemented a number of security precautions to further secure the DHS OIG network,” 

Pierluigi Paganini

(Security Affairs – Department of Homeland Security, data breach)

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