US Marshals Service suffers security breach - spokesman

The US Marshals Service (USMS) suffered a ransomware security breach this month that compromised sensitive law enforcement information, a spokesman said on February 27.

The Marshals Service notified the US Department of Justice of the breach, and agents there began a forensic investigation, Drew Wade, chief of the Marshals Service public affairs office, Al Arabiya reports.

“The affected system contains law enforcement sensitive information, including returns from legal process, administrative information, and personally identifiable information pertaining to subjects of USMS investigations, third parties, and certain USMS employees,” Wade said.

The incident took place on February 17, when the service “discovered a ransomware and data exfiltration event affecting a stand-alone USMS system,” after which the system was disconnected from the network, Wade said.

The USMS is a federal law enforcement agency within the Department of Justice.