Feds Still Leave 21.5M Breached In The Dark

It’s been months since a series of massive cyberattacks rocked the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and left the data of millions compromised, but those victims have yet to be notified.

Officials acknowledged Tuesday (Sept. 1) that the estimated 21.5 million federal employees and contractors whose security clearance data was compromised more than three months ago have not received any confirmation that their personal information was accessed by hackers.

According to Reuters, OPM confirmed that the Defense Department will begin contacting impacted individuals across the government later this month.

In a statement from OPM, the agency announced it awarded Identity Theft Guard Solutions a $133,263,550 contract to provide identity theft protection services for the victims of one of the largest cybercrimes ever carried out against the U.S. government.

“We remain fully committed to assisting the victims of these serious cybercrimes and to taking every step possible to prevent the theft of sensitive data in the future,” Beth Cobert, acting director of the OPM, said in an agency release.

“Millions of individuals, through no fault of their own, had their personal information stolen, and we’re committed to standing by them, supporting them and protecting them against further victimization. And as someone whose own information was stolen, I completely understand the concern and frustration people are feeling.”

Impacted individuals, as well as their dependent minor children (under the age of 18 as of July 1, 2015), will be provided with credit monitoring, identity monitoring, identity theft insurance and identity restoration services for a period of three years, OPM confirmed.

[bctt tweet=”US to spend over $133M on identity theft protection services for OPM data breach victims”]

While it may be understandable to consider OPM needed an adequate amount of time to analyze the full scope of the cyberattacks and perform its own forensic investigation, it remains unclear why there has been such a delay in reaching out to those impacted by the three-month-old attacks.

Back in July, an OPM official, who requested not to be identified, told Reuters the complicated nature of the data, coupled with the fact that government employees and contractors frequently move among various agencies, means it may be some time before all of the victims are notified.

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