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A recent security breach occurred due to an unsecured system within Guardian Australia’s internal networks exposing the personal data of its 140 employees.
This includes tax file numbers, bank account and superannuation information, salary details, and residential addresses.
In a mid-January internal email, its local leaders had informed staff that “we don’t currently believe there is a risk to Australian staff” but had issued a warning that its technical teams were still investigating the incident.
140 persons who worked between February 2017 and May 2019 had their information compromised, The Guardian’s Australian managing director Dan Stinton and editor Lenore Taylor informed local staff in an email on Thursday. Among the employee information that might have been compromised were tax file numbers, bank account information, superannuation information, salary, and addresses.
Stinton and Taylor informed the employees that critical Guardian servers had been compromised during the breach, blocking access to data showing what the hackers had taken until the systems had been rebuilt.
“Our Australia and London teams have been working urgently to enable us to understand whether and which documents and personal data might have been accessed,” Stinton and Taylor wrote.
The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, which investigates data breaches, was informed of the problem, according to a publishing spokeswoman who said that thorough checks had revealed that the personal information of the 140 employees had been impacted.
“A credit monitoring service is in place for all Guardian Australia staff, even though we have seen no evidence that personal data has been exposed online,” the spokeswoman said. “We continue to monitor for this.”
The Media, Entertainment, and Arts Alliance, a union representing many employees at The Guardian, declined to comment on the ransomware attack.
This incident highlights the importance of cyber security and how even large companies can be vulnerable to attacks.
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