14 DAY TRIAL //
The United States Navy got hacked, and the personal details of more than 134,000 sailors were accessed, according to a public statement released by US officials this morning.
The US Navy revealed that 134,386 current and former US sailors were exposed by the breach, and the organization is now working on notifying those affected via mail, phone calls, and letters.
HP notified the Navy of the attack on October 27 when the company discovered that one of the laptops used by an employee as part of the Enterprises Services agreement has been hacked. Navy laptops are operated by sailors based on a contract with HP.
“After analysis by HPES and a continuing Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) investigation, it was determined Nov. 22, 2016, that sensitive information, including the names and Social Security Numbers (SSNs) of 134,386 current and former Sailors were accessed by unknown individuals,” the Navy says.
No information regarding the hacking group
For the moment, there is no evidence that stolen information is being used by the attackers, the Navy claims, but the investigation will continue to make sure that such a thing won’t happen.
“The Navy takes this incident extremely seriously- this is a matter of trust for our Sailors,” said Chief of Naval Personnel Vice Adm. Robert Burke. “We are in the early stages of investigating and are working quickly to identify and take care of those affected by this breach.”
There are no details as to the hacker or the group that attacked the US Navy, but this isn’t the first time when sailors are targeted by cyberattacks.
Back in 2013, the United States blamed Iran for a series of attacks launched against Navy computers, including an unclassified machine network that was used for email and internal intranet. US officials claimed the attacks were launched by the Iranian government or a hacking group that was employed by the government, and said that no valuable information was stolen.
At this point, there’s no sign or confirmation that the attack recorded last week was launched by another government or a hacking group linked to another country.