Agents fearful and angry after 'dangerous' FBI data breach - BBC News
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Inside the FBI hack: Agents fearful and angry after 'dangerous' data breach
By Joe Tidy, Cyber correspondent, BBC World Service
Current and former FBI agents have expressed shock and concern following a hack that appears to have exposed private and personal information of the entire FBI workforce.
"This is really bad for our undercover agents," says one former FBI agent, who worries for the safety of his colleagues.
The former cyber investigator is part of a group chat with current agents who are alarmed that their personal details could soon be freely available online to criminals and hostile nation-state hackers.
They fear they could be targeted, or that criminals could use the data to create convincing phishing attempts, scams, or demands for bribes.
The hacking group ShinyHunters is threatening to publish the stolen databases and documents within four days unless its demands are met.
Some agents are also concerned about the risk of physical attacks from cybercriminals they have investigated.
"One of the things we are discussing in the group chat is 'violence-as-a-service' attacks from young online gangs," says the former worker.
"They could use this information to harass an FBI agent who has worked on their cases."
Personal Concerns
Groups similar to ShinyHunters - believed to be an English-speaking gang - have in the past been linked to swatting incidents and even petrol bomb attacks against law enforcement officers and rivals.
The group claims it breached FBI systems on Monday and later posted details of the attack on its darknet site.
The FBI has not responded to requests for comment. However, on Wednesday, the agency acknowledged the breach, stating they were "aggressively investigating" how it occurred.
For Michael McPherson, a former FBI agent now senior vice president of security operations at cyber firm ReliaQuest, the hack presents "a security threat which cuts to the core of agent safety, particularly their families."
He notes that agents understand the "inherent risks" of their job, "but this incident reportedly includes personal data such as home addresses and contact information, which could expose family members who are normally insulated from the threats associated with such a career."
ShinyHunters shared samples of the alleged stolen data with reporters, along with an extortion demand. The samples appear genuine and include names, addresses, phone numbers, badge numbers, job titles, and information about spouses.
The records appear to relate to thousands of agents, including senior officials such as deputy directors. The criminals also appear to possess highly sensitive medical information relating to thousands of special agents.
BBC News has seen samples of stolen "fitness-for-work" medical examinations containing information such as blood and urine test results, along with doctors' notes mentioning conditions including a "shellfish and banana allergy."
Agents' full names and addresses, as well as references to medical issues like "blood in the urine" and "high cholesterol," are now in the criminals' hands.
Cynthia Kaiser, who was the Deputy Director of Cyber at the FBI and now leads the Research Centre at Halcyon, notes that ShinyHunters appear to have already lost control of some of the data, which is circulating in various online groups of cyber researchers. This could lead to harm even before the main tranche is published.