Two weeks ago OPM, the US Office of Personnel Management got hacked and the information of 4 million federal government workers was exposed. This is of course, horrible. But it’s not all: On Friday we learned that the issue at hand was huge and much bigger than everyone believed at first.

As can be read in a letter to OPM Director Karen Archuletta, David Cox, the president of the  American Federation of Government Employees, believes that “based on the sketchy information OPM has provided, the Central Personnel Data Files was the targeted database, and the hackers are now in possession of all personnel data for every federal employee, every federal retiree, and up to one million former federal employees.”

Cox goes on and says that the thinks the hackers have the Social Security number, military records and even veterans status’ information of every affected person. Addresses, birth dates, job and pay histories, health and life insurances and pension information, age, gender, and almost everything else you’d never want anyone else to know are included on his list as well.

Sounds bad? It’s not all. The letter states: “Worst, we believe that Social Security numbers were not encrypted, a cybersecurity failure that is absolutely indefensible and outrageous.”

I bet they now wish that “only” 4 million records got stolen …

The post OPM: Are Personnel Records of All Fed Workers Exposed? appeared first on Avira Blog.