Residents of Louisiana and Oregon are the victims of a massive security breach, which also appears to have affected the U.S. federal government. The breach was announced Thursday night and apparently has affected millions of people’s private data.
Approximately 3.5 million people in Oregon with state ID cards and driver’s licenses were hit, according to CNN. Louisiana faced the same issue but declined to provide an exact number, though the state has roughly the same number of registered drivers as Oregon. Information such as social security numbers, driver’s license numbers, and other personal information is likely to have been swiped.
Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards said state governments had not been contacted by the hackers nor is there any indication the information stolen has been sold. Those living within Louisiana and Oregon should still take preemptive measures to secure their information to prevent potential identity fraud.
The Department of Energy is one of several government agencies targeted as well and “took immediate steps” to maintain the impact of compromised departments. A number of British corporations have also experienced data breaches, including the BBC and British Airways.
So far, no particular person or hacker organization has been named as the source of these breaches but CNN says it’s likely in connection with a global cyberattack by Russian cybercriminals Clop, as reported yesterday. The software used is the same and “exploits a vulnerability in widely used software.” Although this group is known for issuing “multimillion-dollar ransoms”, no one affected had yet to receive one or any other types of threats.
According to CNN, “Progress Software, the U.S. firm that makes the software exploited by the hackers, said it had discovered a second vulnerability in the codes that the company was working to fix.”
CISA Director Jen Easterly said there have yet to be any “significant impacts” and the attacks were “largely opportunistic” in nature. Possibly the hackers seized an opportunity to create a data breach or are testing out how easy one would be to execute.
If you want to help protect yourself, maybe consider getting a service like LifeLock.