(Reuters) -The U.S. State Department was recently hit by a cyber attack, and notifications of a possible serious breach were made by the Department of Defense Cyber Command, a Fox News reporter tweeted https://bit.ly/3z7RTH7 on Saturday.
It is unclear when the breach was discovered, but it is believed to have happened a couple of weeks ago, according to the Fox News reporter’s Twitter thread. The reporter added the State Department’s ongoing mission to evacuate Americans and allied refugees from Afghanistan has “not been affected.”
Without confirming any incident, a knowledgeable source told Reuters the State Department has not experienced significant disruptions and has not had its operations impeded in any way.
“The Department takes seriously its responsibility to safeguard its information and continuously takes steps to ensure information is protected. For security reasons, we are not in a position to discuss the nature or scope of any alleged cybersecurity incidents at this time”, a State Department spokesperson said in a statement.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru and Humeyra Pamuk in Washington Editing by Chris Reese)
