THREAD: State Dept. Received 'D' Grade, Suffered Another Cyber-Attack
Online security at the federal level was once again compromised. Breaking news on Saturday uncovered that a successful cyber-attack had interfered with U.S. intelligence groups, cited as an issue created by the State Department's omissions with keeping procedure.
A Twitter thread from Fox News' Jacqui Heinrich disclosed that online access to State Department information had been successfully breached by a cyber attacker, without a timeframe of the incident or level of severity made available. An estimate of "a couple of weeks ago" was provided by Heinrich.
As of current reporting, there is no indication that the interference affected the United States' operations within Kabul.
Heinrich concluded the thread by addressing that the State Department, responsible for the security of the American people, had received a "D" grade from a Senate report.
The U.S. Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs' coordinated a staff report that gave a blistering evaluation on the status of the nation's cyber security.
According to the report, online security arranged by the State Department was "ineffective in 4 of 5 function areas," also failing to incorporate — within several sub-departments — a mandated Einstein-3 online protection program, used to "detect and proactively block cyber-attacks or prevent potential compromises."
In June, computers at JBS were hacked, which forced the company to shut down temporarily. JBS is responsible for one-fifth of the nation's supply of beef. The matter was resolved after the U.S. paid a $11m ransom to the hackers.
A rep from the State Department spoke with Fox News regarding the findings.
"The Department takes seriously its responsibility to safeguard its information and continuously takes steps to ensure information is protected. For security reasons, we are not in a position to discuss the nature or scope of any alleged cybersecurity incidents at this time."
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