US Federal Courts Data Breach: Justice Department Investigates Records System Cyberattack

The United States (US) federal courts reportedly experienced a massive data breach in their records system.

Now, the US Justice Department is probing the cyber breach that exposed the records management system of federal courts across the country.

US Federal Courts Data Breach

As per the latest news story by The Verge, the House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler says in his latest testimony that the document system of the US federal courts has been hit by a massive cyber breach.

Nadler testifies that the data breach carries a "startling breadth and scope," which occurred way back in early 2020.

The Verge reports that the Department of Justice has told the judiciary about the massive data breach and informed them that they are already probing the cyberattack.

Meanwhile, the online news outlet went on to note that explicit details regarding the massive data breach remain to be clandestine.

And as such, it is not clear how the cyberattack was carried out or who the threat actors behind it were.

But it is worth noting that in 2021, the federal judiciary system disclosed that it plans to go "low-tech" for all of its sensitive documents. The announcement comes amid the massive SolarWinds hack.

US Justice Department Probes Federal Court Data Breach

According to the latest report by Reuters, the Justice Department has been investigating the data breach in the federal courts.

No less than the head of the National Security Division of the Department of Justice, Matt Olsen, told the Judiciary Committee of the US House of Representatives that he considers the data breach to be a "significant concern."

Olsen further notes that "this is, of course, a significant concern for us given the nature of the information that's often held by the courts."

(Photo : NICOLAS ASFOURI/AFP via Getty Images)
(FILES) In this file photo taken on August 04, 2020, Prince, a member of the hacking group Red Hacker Alliance who refused to give his real name, uses his computer at their office in Dongguan, China's southern Guangdong province.

However, he states that he could not "speak directly to the nature of the ongoing investigation of the type of threats that you've mentioned regarding the effort to compromise public judicial dockets."

Reuters says in its report that the National Security Division head failed to specify who was behind the cyberattack in the records system of the US federal courts.

But despite that, the news outlet notes that Olsen highlights that the National Security Division puts its focus on select countries across the globe, such as China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran.

However, Olsen did not say if the cyber attackers in the federal court records are among these foreign nations.

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Written by Teejay Boris