Hacktivists Leak Personal Details of More Than 40,000 Homeland Security Employees

A hacktivist group has exposed the names, phone numbers and addresses of more than 40,000 people tied to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, including agents, operatives and associates. Some of those named were involved in undercover operations. The breach became public on Wednesday.

The group behind it calls itself the Department of Peace. In an online statement, a spokesperson referred to a remark by Markwayne Mullin on July 17th that he was "turning up the heat." The spokesperson said: "This is what happens to ICE when you do that."

According to the group's online post, the hackers got the data by subverting DHS's single sign-on system. They passed the material to Distributed Denial of Secrets, known as DDoSecrets, which published it in a database called Icepick. The Department of Peace also gave the data to Ryan Ottignon, a U.S.-based journalist, and to a Swiss hacker known as maia arson crimew. Ottignon told NPR the two built a searchable online database, with crimew handling all of the technical work.

DDoSecrets cofounder Emma Best described the leak as "extraordinary but deceptive in its simplicity." Best said it draws explicit links to officials who oversee covert and undercover operations, as well as to key personnel in DHS's rendition and deportation programs.

Other activists say the records could help people investigating the department. Freedom of information requests often return little of use because they lack specifics such as names and email addresses, and this data could fill that gap.

DHS said in a statement that it is "aware of a potential breach and is actively working to address the situation swiftly and effectively." The department added that it is taking necessary steps to ensure all are properly protected.

More than 21,000 of the records identify employees of U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Roughly 10,000 more relate to Immigration and Customs Enforcement employees and its Homeland Security Investigations unit. The leak follows similar hacking attacks at the FBI. Even so, the database is far from complete. It covers about a fifth of a DHS workforce of a little more than 220,000 people.

Ottignon, who has worked on similar data leak projects, rejected the idea that those involved are doxing government employees. Ottignon pointed to public officials who travel through cities and states and try to hide who they are, often wearing masks and plain clothes, while doing what Ottignon called "universally unspeakable things" to communities. Ottignon said such behavior is unacceptable in a free society and described the database as one step in an oversight process. "We need oversight for useful government, if it exists at all," Ottignon said.

A note attached to the files by DDoSecrets reads: "They have our information, so it's only fair that we have theirs."