DHS Leaks Expose 41,000 Employees

Personal data for more than 41,000 Department of Homeland Security employees was stolen in a cyberattack that exposed names, phone numbers, and office locations. The intrusion targeted Okta, an identity and access management service used by the department.

Reports from TechCrunch and Wired identify the intruder as a hacker operating under the name Department of Peace. Approximately 21,000 of the compromised records belong to Customs and Border Protection agents. Nearly 7,000 records are tied to Immigration and Customs Enforcement staff.

The stolen files also include data from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, US Citizenship and Immigration Services, and Homeland Security Investigations. The leak creates a tension with departmental efforts to keep field agent identities private during recent anti-immigration raids.

The hacker justified the release of the data with a comment on mutual access. According to TechCrunch, the intruder stated, "They have our information, so it's only fair that we have theirs." This follows a recent breach where hackers stole employee and applicant data from the FBI.

The dataset, labeled Icepick, was passed to cybersecurity researcher maia arson crimew. The nonprofit Distributed Denial of Secrets now hosts the collection. The files link certain DHS groups to surveillance tools, including the facial recognition app Mobile Fortify and the data collection tool PenLink.

The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Verge regarding the scope of the breach.