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martyb writes:

From Security Week we have a report that nearly a quarter-million people have had Personally Identifiable Information (PII) compromised by the Department of Homeland Security:

The privacy incident involved a database used by the DHS Office of the Inspector General (OIG) which was stored in the DHS OIG Case Management System.

The incident impacted approximately 247,167 current and former federal employees that were employed by DHS in 2014. The exposed Personally identifiable information (PII) of these individuals includes names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, positions, grades, and duty stations.

Individuals (both DHS employees and non-DHS employees) associated with DHS OIG investigations from 2002 through 2014 (including subjects, witnesses, and complainants) were also affected by the incident, the DHS said.

The PII associated with these individuals varies depending on the documentation and evidence collected for a given case and could include names, social security numbers, alien registration numbers, dates of birth, email addresses, phone numbers, addresses, and personal information provided in interviews with DHS OIG investigative agents.

The data breach wasn’t the result of an external attack, the DHS claims. The leaked data was found in an unauthorized copy of the DHS OIG investigative case management system that was in the possession of a former DHS OIG employee.

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

“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 exfiltration,” DHS explained.

No word on whether or not the copy was encrypted in any fashion. Is this a genuine issue, or just the result of an employee making a local copy of the DHS case management system for working at from home?

Original Submission