The US government has taken another cybersecurity hit. According to CBC and The Hill, the transparency group Distributed Denial of Secrets (DDoSecrets) yesterday published personal information on more than 40,000 employees of the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
What leaked
According to reports, the data includes names, phone numbers and email addresses of staff in several parts of the department: Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), and CISA, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which is itself responsible for the government's cyber defense. DDoSecrets attributes the material to an anonymous source calling itself "Department of Peace" and has not said how it was obtained.
What the department says
In a statement, the department said it is "aware of the potential data breach and actively working to address the situation swiftly and effectively". The exact number is still disputed: some reports cite more than 40,000 records and others more than 41,000, possibly because of contractors and duplicates. Reports that the intrusion went through Okta accounts have not been verified, and Okta said it sees no sign its own systems were compromised.
Why it is dangerous
Even basic-looking data such as names, phone numbers and emails is excellent raw material for attackers. It enables targeted phishing, impersonation and personal threats against employees, especially enforcement staff such as ICE agents, whose work is politically contentious in the US. That CISA staff were also exposed shows that no organization is immune, not even the one responsible for protecting everyone else.
