The DfE hack led to 607,000 pieces of data being released on the dark web and was thought to have been carried out for financial gain rather than ideological reasons.<\/p>\n
The group said online: \u201cOnce your company\u2019s data is posted here, it\u2019s NEVER leaving the public eye and it will be passed around the internet FOREVER. The payment we request of you is simply a rounding error compared to the litigation costs of your data leaking. Be smart and just pay.\u201d<\/p>\n
One source said the majority of officers have used the legal database during their career to complete day-to-day police duties.<\/p>\n
The system is responsible for England and Wales, where 145,550 full-time officers are employed,.<\/p>\n
Tiff Lynch, chairman of the Police Federation<\/a>, said: \u201cThis reported breach raises serious concerns for officer and staff safety. At a time when cyber threats are becoming increasingly sophisticated, [the police] and its partners must be properly funded to ensure the strongest possible cybersecurity protections<\/a> are in place to safeguard sensitive personal data.\u201d<\/p>\n Seen as softer targets<\/p>\n Jake Moore, global security adviser at Eset, Europe\u2019s leading cybersecurity company, said: \u201cUnfortunately government organisations are being seen as softer targets because they have not invested enough to properly protect private information.<\/p>\n \u201cThe information put on the dark web should not be underestimated. More experienced threat actors see it as highly valuable because it enables them to personalise follow-up attacks, such as phishing or social engineering, which puts even more data at risk.\u201d<\/p>\n Newcastle University has launched an investigation after the group allegedly stole 440,000 pieces of sensitive data including full names, phone numbers, home addresses and email addresses of staff and students.<\/p>\n Mr Moore added: \u201cThese attacks are becoming more common as criminals increasingly automate their tactics with ease and exploit the development using AI. The knock-on effect means organisations are facing a far higher volume of attacks, often with far less effort required from the attacker.\u201d<\/p>\n A government spokesman said: \u201cWe have dedicated capabilities to respond to cyber incidents, and it would be inappropriate to comment on a live investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n An NCA spokesman told The Times: \u201cWe are aware that limited personal details relating to a number of National Crime Agency officers may have been published on the dark web as a result of the incident affecting the police national legal database.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The DfE hack led to 607,000 pieces of data being released on the dark web and was thought…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":725493,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[963,21027,239856,49,69332,24486,10721,50,5438,51,47,52,48,225],"class_list":["post-725492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-cyber-attacks","tag-cyber-crime","tag-department-for-education","tag-headlines","tag-ministry-of-defence","tag-national-crime-agency","tag-national-security","tag-news","tag-standard","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-uk-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=725492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/725493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=725492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=725492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=725492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}