France statistics agency Insee confirms cyberattack on staff data
France's national statistics department Insee said a cyberattack had led to a breach of personal data from its directory, affecting about 12,800 current and former staff and members of Insee-related civil service corps.
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France's national statistics department Insee said a cyberattack had led to a breach of personal data from its directory, affecting about 12,800 current and former staff and members of Insee-related civil service corps.
- INSEE suffered a cyberattack affecting its staff directory.
- Around 12.8k employees/former employees are impacted.
- Exposed data is limited to names and work contact details.
Key Takeaways by nexos.ai, reviewed by Cybernews staff.
According to Insee, the compromised data was limited to identities and professional contact information. The agency stated that no highly sensitive details such as passwords, personal addresses, banking information, social security numbers, or medical records were exposed.
According to the French-language cyber news site Cyberattaque, someone using the pseudonym “Saturne” posted a database on a cybercriminal forum that originated from trombi.insee.fr – the internal directory of the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (Insee).
Trombi.insee.fr allows staff members to look up professional contact details, work assignments, and various administrative details regarding the agency's personnel.
The alleged file reportedly contains 12,796 records corresponding to the agency's staff members.
This breach is one of several that France’s government sector has faced recently. Cybernews has previously reported that the French government’s instant messaging and collaboration tool, Tchap, was also breached. A total of 73,467 users were affected, with their data leaked onto the dark web.
In April, The French government confirmed that its database used to secure identity documents has been breached, exposing around 19 million records containing passport, national ID card, and driver’s license data.
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