14 DAY TRIAL // The Washington State Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) – the state agency that provides information about the financing of political campaigns, lobbyist expenditures, and the financial affairs of public officials – has been hacked.
According to the Associated Press, a virus infected the PDCs networks on August 17. However, the actual breach took place only on September 8.
The agency’s CTO, Michael Smith, revealed that they were notified of the intrusion last week by the Consolidated Technology Services (CTS). The CTS was notified by the FBI after some of the PDCs passwords were spotted on a hacker website.
Fortunately, the attackers haven’t managed to obtain any sensitive information.
“We believe it was mostly for a reconnaissance mission to identify machines on our network,” Smith noted.
Initially, it was assumed that a domestic entity was behind the attack. However, they later determined that this might have been the work of a foreign government.
On the other hand, representatives of Washington’s Governor, Jay Inslee, say “there’s no good evidence” that a foreign government is involved.