Gill Gifford reports: Most online services, the payment of child maintenance to beneficiaries and the electronic recording of court proceedings is virtually back to normal after last month’s ransomware attack on the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development. The September attack led to a massive crisis, causing major disruptions to all divisions — including the…
Category: Government Sector
Parents furious after personal information is leaked in 2nd data breach in online program
Rachel Keller reports: The Virginia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services (DBHDS) is now investigating after some residents’ personal information was leaked in a data breach of one of their online programs. At 10 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 7, families on the waiting list to receive Individual and Family Support Program funding logged onto the…
Plumsted Township reveals data breach in April-May
Today’s reminder that health data shows up everywhere: an attack on Plumsted Township in New Jersey via employees’ email accounts. For more than 1 month, the attacker had access to their email environment. From the town’s notification: While the specific data elements vary for each potentially affected individual, and it is important to note that…
Threat actors sometimes name the wrong victims — so why are you just repeating their claims?
Since March, 2021, data exfiltrated from Butler County Sheriff’s Office has been dumped on the dark web and clear net, but those affected may never have known that because the threat actors named the wrong victim. Relying too much on the word of criminals, researchers and compilations also misidentified the victim. Researchers and journalists should…
Transnational fraud ring stole millions from Army members, veterans
Sergiu Gatlan reports: Fredrick Brown, a former U.S. Army contractor, was sentenced today to 151 months in prison after admitting to his role in a conspiracy that targeted thousands of U.S. service members and veterans and caused millions of dollars in losses. Brown was one of five fraudsters charged with carrying out an identify-theft and…
City of Dallas calls IT protocols ‘inadequate’ in 131-page report on police data loss
Ryan Osborne reports: Dallas’ city information technology department sent a 131-page report to city council on Thursday, detailing the massive data loss involving police records earlier this year and attributing the issue to “inadequate” protocols among IT staff. The report confirmed that 22 terabytes of data, involving more than 8 million records, were deleted in…