Cybercriminals have recently hacked the White House’s unclassified computer network, resulting in temporary disruptions of few services. Washington Post report says that Russia is behind the breach as it has already been accused of hacking the US military’s classified networks, which was discovered in 2008.
The Washington Post reported that the hackers thought to be working for the Russian government may have breached the unclassified White House computer networks in the recent weeks. The breach was discovered two to three weeks ago, after U.S. officials were alerted to it by an unnamed ally, says Washington post.
The White House official said that in the course of assessing recent threats, they identified activity of concern on the unclassified Executive Office of the President network. According to the same official, they took immediate actions to evaluate and mitigate the activity. However, while taking steps to address suspicious activity detected on its network, unfortunately some of it resulted in the disruption of regular services to users.
According to reports, Intranet or VPN access was shut off for a while, but the email system, apart from some minor delays, was working fine. Additionally, some staffers were asked to change their passwords too.
White House officials admitted that some elements of the unclassified network was affected and they dealt with the situation immediately, but the new measures have led to temporary shut-downs of the network and loss of connectivity for some White House employees. However, these activities did not damage any of the systems and that, till date, there is no evidence that the classified network was hacked.
They added that a variety of actors find their networks to be attractive targets and seek access to sensitive information. However, the White House declined to comment on a Washington Post report that says Russia was thought to be behind the breach.
