Jeb Boone reports: Hackers around the world are setting their sights on Venezuela’s government web properties following violent repression against anti-government protesters and instances of internet censorship. Already, hacker groups have defaced, deleted and waged DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks on Venezuelan government and military sites. Spearheaded by South American Anons, as the hackers…
Category: Government Sector
Arizona pension system admits data was taken last year by former high-ranking employee
Craig Harris reports: The statewide trust that manages pensions for police officers, firefighters, politicians and corrections officers notified its members and their employers this week of a potential security breach even though trust managers have known about the issue since last fall. Christa Severns, a spokeswoman for the Public Safety Personnel Retirement System, said Friday…
Ex-Miami cop gets 12 years for ID theft, tax fraud
There’s another update to a case involving corrupt Miami law enforcement officers previously covered on this blog. Jay Weaver of the Miami Herald recently reported that Malinsky Bazile was sentenced to 12 years in prison for stealing hundreds of people’s names from a Florida driver’s license database to score $140,000 in fraudulent income-tax refunds (h/t, eSecurityPlanet).
Snowden Swiped Password From NSA Coworker – NSA memo
Michael Isikoff reports that although Edward Snowden has publicly denied using co-workers’ credentials to access documents he downloaded and shared with media outlets: A civilian NSA employee recently resigned after being stripped of his security clearance for allowing former agency contractor Edward Snowden to use his personal log-in credentials to access classified information, according to an…
UK: South Yorkshire police admit 70 data breaches
Police chiefs in South Yorkshire have defended the force’s record for abiding by the Data Protection Act – despite admitting officers and staff have breached the rules on 70 occasions. Forces across the country have released details, under the Freedom of Information Act, of how many times data breaches occurred during a four year period….
Indictment Charges IRS Employee With Tax Fraud And Aggravated Identity Theft
Sherelle Pratt, 49, of Philadelphia, was charged by Indictment, unsealed this week, with filing false tax returns, aiding and assisting other individuals in preparing and filing false tax returns, theft of government property, and aggravated identity theft. According the Indictment Pratt is an IRS employee. Pratt, according to the indictment, is alleged to have prepared…