Saturday, November 09, 2024

FBI: Hackers Are Sending Police Data Requests to Tech Giants

The FBI is warning that hackers are obtaining private user information -- including emails and phone numbers -- from U.S.-based tech companies by compromising government and police email addresses to submit "emergency" data requests.

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... The FBI's public notice filed this week is a rare admission from the federal government about the threat from fraudulent emergency data requests, a legal process designed to help police and federal authorities obtain information from companies to respond to immediate threats affecting someone's life or property. The abuse of emergency data requests is not new, and has been widely reported in recent years. Now, the FBI warns that it saw an "uptick" around August in criminal posts online advertising access to or conducting fraudulent emergency data requests, and that it was going public for awareness.

"Cyber-criminals are likely gaining access to compromised US and foreign government email addresses and using them to conduct fraudulent emergency data requests to US based companies, exposing the personal information of customers to further use for criminal purposes," reads the FBI's advisory. ...


#1 | Posted by LampLighter at 2024-11-09 12:16 AM

This reminds me of when I worked at a telecom company many years ago. Someone called in claiming to be a police officer and requesting personal information about a customer. I was going to escalate the call, but the person above me just said to give him the information because "they'll just get a warrant anyway". Seemed like this was common practice at the time, even though no one verified the caller was law enforcement, as far as I know.

#2 | Posted by sentinel at 2024-11-09 12:42 AM

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