The Office of Personnel Management finally began notifying those affected in their major breach on September 30.
The OPM discovered malicious activity affecting their information systems back in April of this year. The DH intrusion detection system, known as EINSTEIN confirmed the data breach in May, but somehow they’re just now getting around to actually notifying those affected The breach affected both IT systems, and the data stores at the Department of the Interior’s data center, which is used by multiple federal agencies. In the end, 22.1 million people were affected by this data breach.
The notification letter included information regarding how to get free identity theft protection and credit monitoring services.
“The notices will contain a personalized identification number (PIN) number which is necessary to enroll in the covered services,” Beth Cobert, acting Director of PErsonnel Management for the United States said in a blog, “OPM and the Department of Defense have continued to analyze the impacted data to verify its quality and completeness, and in this process, we determined that approximately 5.6 million of the impacted individuals had their fingerprints stolen. If an individual’s fingerprints were taken, this will be noted in their letter.”
THe Office of Personnel Management has teamed up with the DEfense Department in order to try and shore up the leaks in their system. Advanced Onion, a multi-branched technology company, was given a $1.8 million contract to find and notify those affected. They are currently building a website to help people check if they’ve been affected and how.
“We’re committed to getting this right. What this means is that, while the notifications are beginning this week, it could take considerable time to deliver them all,” Cobert added. “My personal data was also stolen in this breach, and I am eager to get my notification letter as soon as possible so that I can sign up for these services,” she said. “However, given the sensitive nature of the database that was breached — and the sheer volume of people affected — we are all going to have to be patient throughout this notification process.”
Cobert may have believed that adding the fact that her info was breached would make it seem more personal, but the reality is that she at least is aware that she has been breached. Everyone else would probably like to have been aware that they needed to be watching for their sensitive information to be misused for the last several months.
For information on how you can prevent your organization from being breached, visit www.miltonsecurity.com or call 714-515-4011.
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