WASHINGTON — The Office of Personnel Management revealed on Thursday that “sensitive information” about 21.5 million people was obtained last year by hackers who intruded into its computer networks.
The agency said the incident was separate from, but related to, a previous breach that compromised the personnel data of 4.2 million federal employees.
The extent of the breach announced on Thursday included 19.7 million people who had applied for background investigations and 1.8 million others who were mostly their spouses or cohabitants.
The agency said in a statement that a forensic investigation had concluded “with high confidence” that the individuals’ information, including Social Security numbers, was stolen from background investigation databases. Some of the records included material from interviews conducted by background checkers, and about 1.1 million of them included fingerprints.
In a blog post on Thursday, Katherine Archuleta, the agency’s director, said she was taking a series of steps in response to the hacking, including creating a cybersecurity adviser position at the agency, consulting with private-sector experts on technological threats and establishing an online cybersecurity incident resource center. She also said the office would offer credit and identity theft monitoring and protection services to those whose information was compromised.
“It is critical that all of O.P.M.’s constituents – most importantly, those who are directly impacted by these breaches – receive information in a timely, transparent and accurate manner,” Ms. Archuleta wrote. “As I have said before, we take these incidents extremely seriously and, accordingly, are taking a number of steps to address both our cybersecurity and our process going forward.”
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