Whitehouse’s communication entity ‘Defense Information System Agency(DISA)’ becomes victim to cyberattack

The US agency that takes care of secured military communication in and out Whitehouse has been hacked and found to have exposed personal data of about 200,000 people. The Defense Information System Agency (DISA) takes of military grade communications in Whitehouse including that of the US President Donald Trump, the agency has sent letters to the affected people on Feb 11, 2020 stating that their data could have been compromised and it is their policy to inform the individuals about the data breach. 

The data breach does include social security numbers and names of the individuals, which are otherwise referred as Personal Identifiable Information (PII). DISA is composed of 8000 military personnel and also handles data of other individuals. Surprisingly, the attack had occurred during the summer of 2019, and has been detected only this month. A spokesperson of DISA, have mentioned that Department of Defense is continuously hit by cyberattacks and we always try to keep the best security we can to protect our data. 

Andy Piazza, one of the recipient for DISA letters, had mentioned that he isn’t concerned about the PII, but what troubles him is the number of data breach alerts he is receiving in recent times.

It is quite shocking when even the DISA can’t stay safe against cyberattacks. This is another red light for businesses around the world to understand the seriousness of cybersecurity to keep themselves updated and secured with right cybersecurity strategies. 

Cyberattacks are evolving everyday, it is better if businesses could follow the cybersecurity frameworks and data protection policies to keep the cyberattacks at bay. Also, businesses should practice data breach notification policies like DISA to intimate the victims about their PII breach.

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