Thousands of Government Officials Exposed Using Cheating Website
Internet hackers discovered hundreds of U.S. government employees used their work emails and computers to log onto the cheating website Ashley Madison.
On Tuesday, hackers released detailed records on millions of people registered with the website, which acts as a network for users to facilitate extramarital affairs. The site's slogan is "Life is short. Have an affair."
The data revealed that over 15,000 of the email addresses used to register accounts within the last five years could be traced back to government and military servers. According to The Associated Press, this includes "at least two assistant U.S. attorneys; an information technology administrator in the Executive Office of the President; a division chief, an investigator and a trial attorney in the Justice Department; a government hacker at the Homeland Security Department and another DHS employee who indicated he worked on a U.S. counterterrorism response team."
Analysis conducted by the AP also found hundreds of transactions linked to the Department of Defense networks.
Operating under the name "Impact Team," hackers have been holding hostage the dating profiles of those who registered on the site, reports The Hill. The group also threatened to out the cheaters if the site's owner, Avid Life Media, didn't shut down Ashley Madison. They have indicated their mission is to publicly shame the company and teach the adulterers a lesson.
"I was doing some things I shouldn't have been doing," a Justice Department investigator told the AP. However, when asked about the threat of blackmail, the investigator said he would confess his infidelity to his family and employer before succumbing to blackmail.
"I've worked too hard all my life to be a victim of blackmail. That wouldn't happen," he said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
David Kennedy, CEO of information security company TrustedSec, which monitors cyberattacks, said that the data released appears to be authentic.
"This dump appears to be legit," said, he wrote in a blog post. "Very, very legit."
Meanwhile, Robert Graham, CEO of Errata Security, wrote in a blog post that the account includes "full account information" like the users' first and last names, emails, phone numbers, addresses, and passwords.
"It also includes dating information, like height, weight, and so forth," Graham added. "It appears to contain addresses, as well as GPS coordinates. I suspect that many people created fake accounts, but with an app that reported their real GPS coordinates."
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