Data on nuclear agency workers hacked: lawmaker

Data on nuclear agency workers hacked: lawmaker
Fri Jun 9, 2006 7:57 PM ET

By Chris Baltimore

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A computer hacker got into the U.S. agency that guards the country's nuclear weapons stockpile and stole the personal records of at least 1,500 employees and contractors, a senior U.S. lawmaker said on Friday.

The target of the hacker, the National Nuclear Safety Administration, is the latest agency to reveal that sensitive private information about government workers was stolen.

The incident happened last September but top Energy Department officials were not told about it until this week, prompting the chairman of the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee to demand the resignation of the head of the NNSA.

An NNSA spokesman was not available for comment.

The NNSA is a semi-autonomous arm of the Energy Department and also guards some of the U.S. military's nuclear secrets and responds to global nuclear and radiological emergencies.

Committee chairman Rep. Joe Barton said NNSA Administrator Linton Brooks should be "removed from your office as expeditiously as possible" because he did not quickly notify senior Energy Department officials of the breach.

"And I mean like 5 o'clock this afternoon if it's possible," Barton, a Texas Republican, said in a statement.

Earlier this week the Pentagon revealed that personal information on about 2.2 million active-duty, National Guard and Reserve troops was stolen last month from a government employee's house.

That comes on top of the theft of data on 26.5 million U.S. military veterans, the Department of Veterans Affairs has said.

A spokesman for Energy Secretary Sam Bodman declined comment on the call for Brooks' resignation but said the secretary was "deeply disturbed about the way this was handled internally" and would make it a priority to notify workers about the lapse.

The "vast majority" of those workers were contractors, not direct government employees, said the spokesman Craig Stevens.

According to Barton, the NNSA chief knew about the incident soon after it happened in September but did not inform Energy Department officials, including Bodman, until Wednesday.

"I don't see how you could meet with (Bodman) every day the last seven or eight months and not inform him," Barton said.

He said Brooks cited "bureaucratic confusion" to explain the reporting lapse.

"It appears that each side of that organization assumed that the other side had made the appropriate notification," Brooks told the House energy panel's oversight and investigations subcommittee, according to a record provided by Barton's office.

"Just as the secretary just learned about this week, I learned this week that the secretary didn't know," Brooks said. "There are a number of us who in hindsight should have done things differently on informing."

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsartic ... rss&rpc=22

Just another massive security failure in Bushland.

Looks like we'll need to give Homeland Security another $100 billion or so.

Incredible. I really do not know what to say. There is absolutely no security in this country, none, on any front. Our government is at best highly inept and at worst treasonous and complicit in all these security breaches (my opinion).

I think it is time for massive pink slips. After all if we performed in our jobs the way they do we would be fired for incompetence.

I believe this is being allowed to happen, and certain people are getting this information for later use. It's becoming way to common.

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I believe this is being allowed to happen, and certain people are getting this information for later use. It's becoming way to common.

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Yes, I too believe that it is a conspiracy to gather information about US citizens to hand over to Mexico..sort of like the body snatchers.

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Originally Posted by Rockfish

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I believe this is being allowed to happen, and certain people are getting this information for later use. It's becoming way to common.

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Yes, I too believe that it is a conspiracy to gather information about US citizens to hand over to Mexico..sort of like the body snatchers.

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You got it, but they have to report it so it doesn't turn into a scandal later on. I have a few thoughts on what they'll be doing with the info but I'm still kickin em around for a bit. For one, lets say someone stole your identity, along with every detail of your life, medical, education, etc, etc, everything but your face, and then your entire life was erased from record , no record of you paying bills, owning anything, never attended schools of any type, never even had a job, then they come for you. That person who "fits" and goes along with, slips in your spot in society, and you just vanish.... far fetched, but thats one.

xianleather, What was the name of the Sandra Bullock movie, where her identity gets erased?

My best friend, last Oct. got a bounced check. She knew she had $20,000 dollars that she had just put in that account (against my concerns) because she was tired of fighting with her insurance co. about the loss of her roof during Hurricane Katrina (yep, Miami got clobbered too, I had a tornado during it) and was going to use her own total life savings to get her roof on, during that ins. fight.

She called her bank. The account was empty. After investigation, turns out the account was emptied by a hacker in Russia. She doesn't even have a computer, nor does she do anything online. Except at work. Nothing personal. :evil: :evil: :evil: 8O

What really gets me is the fact they came out with a real phoney excuse. An employee takes the database home and then he's burglarized? What a load of crap, it has all the signs of a coverup. I just got my notice from the VA today telling me my stuff was stolen. As for SS, there should be a way in place for employees keep their companies from taking out our fed tax automatically. I don't believe they can do that if you sign a W4. If I could sign a 1099, I would and not pay my fed tax. We should be able to use our tax to revolt. I feel this way because I really feel by the time I retire, I won't have any SS benefits.

There was a report here, locally, a few days after the Vet records were hacked and stolen. That another such theft has taken place with college students personal info as well. I think it was around 16,000 stolen.