Cyber terror group "Play" says it stole thousands of files from Dallas County
DALLAS (CBSNewsTexas.com) — Dallas County employees are bracing for the impact of another reported cyber attack months after a crippling data theft in May.
The post appeared Saturday on a list of active ransomware attacks committed by a person or group identified as "Play."
It states "private documents of Dallas County departments" will go up for sale on the dark web unless an unspecified ransom is paid by Friday.
CBS News Texas spoke to county employees about their concerns about why they weren't notified before Monday that they could fall victim to identity theft.
"In my profession, knowing what people can do with this type of information is very concerning," said Chris Dyer of the Dallas County Sheriff's Assocation.
Dyer is a sheriff's deputy and one of the 8,600 county employees who may have had personal information compromised.
"Initially, back on Friday the 20th, we received an email saying we needed to reset our passwords," he shared.
Ten days later, employees were notified of the security incident by a news release from Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins which stated in part:
"As the investigation is still ongoing, we do not want to make premature assumptions about the extent of impact or other details."
Cyber security experts like Bradley Burback are surprised that county leaders waited 10 days to notify their employees.
"It's absolutely concerning that they weren't notified," Burback said. "If you ever do any personal stuff on the work network or work computer, then potentially your personal information is compromised."
Of the county employees CBS News Texas spoke to, none who work at the jail or health department were aware of the breach.
The ransomware attack committed by Play comes shortly after they stole and released personal information of city employees in Oakland, California.
"It had quite a significant impact and this same group also attacked the City of Antwerp in Belgium," explained cyber threat anaylst Brett Callow.
If this cyber attack compromises the personal information of Dallas County employees, Dyer says its leaders need to be held accountable for not alerting them earlier.
He is also calling on the county to offer free credit monitoring to all employees while they wait to find out the scope of the data breach.