AAFES Confirms SIGA Hack, Confidential Information of 98,000 Military Personnel Breached
Hackers who managed to break into the SIGA Telecom, a German telecom provider and an Army and Air Force Exchange Service (AAFES) contractor said the names, addresses, emails and technical information belonging to some 98,000 U.S. military personnel stationed overseas may have been compromised.
SIGA, the company offering the AAFES an on-base cell phone concessionaire suffered an attack last week, resulting in a severe breach. “The Exchange learned on February 11 of a data breach of customer information held by concessionaire SIGA Telecom,” AAFES spokesperson, Chris Ward, told Military.com in an email last week.
SIGA officials did not reply to make an immediate comment on Friday, following the breach.
“There was no financial information released,” Ward assured. “To date, there is no evidence of fraudulent use of the information.”
Shortly after the SIGA data breach was uncovered, the company immediately took their systems offline, and began an investigating a breach. SIGA also contacted German authorities in an effort to find and prosecute the proper individual/s who are responsible for the SIGA breach. Though details are scarce, Ward said an investigation is ongoing.
SIGA notified 27,500 active account holders of the breach on March 5th, shortly after the company was notified Ward said. AAFES representative have met with SIGA executives to review the details of what may have been breached and discuss proper steps to take following the breach.
AAFES has required SIGA to notify their customers, setup a telephone information line, develop a plan to counteract the attack and re-evaluate the company’s security within 90 days.
