Tucson city in Arizona announced experiencing a data breach incident, wherein the hacker breached the municipality’s network and stole massive data of individuals’ sensitive information. Reports reveal that this incident impacted over 125,000 people.
On May 17 to 31 this year, the hackers stayed inside Tucson’s network, allowing them to steal sensitive files that contained the information of the affected individuals. It was May 29 when the victimised city noticed suspicious activity on a user’s network account, where the threat actors had stolen some data enclosed in it.
By the latter part of September, Tucson started notifying all affected individuals.
According to the reports on the incident, the hackers might have accessed and stolen several sensitive data of affected individuals, including their full names, residential addresses, driver’s licenses, passport numbers, and Social Security numbers. Authorities immediately notified the people about this potential compromise on their data.
The incident review concluded last September 12, when all the impacted data had been revealed. The affected individuals were also notified that their data had not been proven to be used for malicious activities by any threat actor.
Nevertheless, it is still important for the individuals affected by the breach incident to continuously monitor their credit and banking reports and report if any suspicious activity occurs. In most cases, threat actors steal people’s sensitive data and use them for identity theft or fraudulent transactions.
In aiding the victims with security against potential attack threats, Tucson city authorities have provided 12 months’ worth of free access to Experian credit monitoring and identity protection services. They were also provided with appropriate guidance to further protect and defend themselves from any malicious cyber activities.
Added to the breach notifications sent to the people is an assurance that Tucson city treats data security with utmost priority. The authorities also apologised for all inconveniences caused by the unfortunate event.
Furthermore, the city authorities are reviewing existing cybersecurity policies and procedures and evaluating which additional measures they could implement to ensure people’s safety moving forward.
