Email accounts from the Treasury Department of the US were compromised in what could have been one of the biggest and worst cyberattacks in US history. Said hacking incident is being blamed to Russian government hackers.
The statement came from US Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon. He is also a member of the Senate Finance Committee, in which he mentioned that the Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service or IRS officials told the committee about the incident and claims that it "appears to be significant" even if there was no taxpayer data that was compromised and affected by the attack.
Yet though they have already confirmed the news and revealed it to the knowledge of the public, the senator said that the "full depth" of the attack on the Treasury Department is still unknown, and on how it happened in a snap.
The Impact of the Cyberattack
The attack involved the dozens of email accounts and access to the Department Offices division of the Treasury Department. Senator Wyden also included the fact that it is also the home for some of the department's highest-ranking officials, and that the breach also adds the theft of the encryption keys.
US officials has suspected that the attack was primarily caused by Russian-affiliated hackers which also impacted the Department of Homeland Security, Agriculture, Energy, and Commerce. It was also then confirmed that the attack was also a part of the SolarWinds Orion hack which was reported to service a total of more than 18,000 customers in the US and on some other countries. And it also lists the Los Alamos National Laboratory which oversees and manages all the nation's nuclear weapons to be affected by the attack as well.
Other private companies and entities has also confirmed that the cyberattack was massive, and could be potentially listed, if not the most, but one of the most difficult attacks to deal with in the history of US.
Some Relative Statements and Testimonies from Other Companies and Entities
Multi tech giant Microsoft issued a statement last week that the attack has "reached many major capitals outside Russia", and also gave a warning to the Treasury Department to compromise, which started way back in July this year. They also confirmed that the are about more than 40 government agencies, non-government organizations, IT companies and businesses, and as well as "think tanks" which were also infiltrated by the Hackers.
Tech and software company FireEye's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Kevin Mandia also appeared in an interview with CBS news' "Face the Nation", and also labeled the scope of the attack as the worst in the US to date. He then mentioned in the interview that FireEye has detected that they were also hacked as part of the attack.
The attack shows that Russia, and maybe, other countries and entities continue to gain unauthorized access and infiltration within the US' premises in the cyberspace or cyberenvironment. This issue would likely go on as the years would go by.
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