CNN reports: A researcher says the Pentagon exposed huge amounts of web-monitoring data in a security failure. Anyone with a free Amazon Web Services account could have looked at the hoard of information stored in the cloud by the U.S. Defense Department, according to Chris Vickery, a researcher at cybersecurity firm UpGuard who discovered the exposure. Read more…
Category: Government Sector
Italy investigates Anonymous hack of state employees’ emails
Reuters reports: Italian police are investigating a hack into the email accounts of government employees by activist group Anonymous, which then published documents it had extracted. On its Italian blog Anonymous uploaded a screenshot of an email purportedly sent from a government email address to an employee of the prime minister’s office containing the names…
Cyta fined for allowing employee to leak personal data
State owned telecommunications authority (Cyta) was fined on Wednesday €10,000 for violating personal data, after an employee gave confidential data of over 200 customers to a retired police officer. The fine was handed down by the commissioner for personal data protection, Irini Loizidou. Read more on Cyprus Mail.
Social Security numbers of 2,100 Maine foster care participants posted online
J. Craig Anderson reports: The names, addresses and Social Security numbers of roughly 2,100 Mainers who receive foster care benefits were accidentally posted to a public website in September, the Maine Office of Information Technology said Monday. The incident was the responsibility of an employee of a contractor, Knowledge Services, who still has a contract…
Alabama Resident Convicted in Stolen Identity Refund Fraud Schemes That Sought $26 Million
This case has been going on for years. You can find previous coverage of it on this site either by searching for individual defendants’ names or searching for “Alabama Department of Corrections.” From the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Middle District of Alabama on November 9: A Phenix City, Alabama resident was convicted today by a federal…
Security flaw may have exposed personal info on 21,000 Utah Express Pass users
Oops? Art Raymond reports: A vigilant UDOT Express Pass customer discovered a glaring security breach in the third-party website that manages pass accounts, but state officials don’t yet know if the personal information of approximately 21,000 current and former customers has been compromised. That information on customers who have purchased passes for accessing HOV lanes…