Act Daily News
—
A Republican congressman who serves on the House Homeland Security Committee stated Congress “will be coming for answers” after a hacker revealed the Transportation Security Administration’s no-fly checklist of identified or suspected terrorists was accessible on an unsecured pc server.
“The entire US no-fly list – with 1.5 million+ entries – was found on an unsecured server by a Swiss hacker,” Bishop stated in a tweet. “Besides the fact that the list is a civil liberties nightmare, how was this info so easily accessible?”
The North Carolina lawmaker, who sits on the House Homeland Security Committee, indicated Congress will examine the information publicity revealed on Friday.
“We’ll be coming for answers,” Bishop claimed, presumably making the breach the newest in a protracted checklist of inquiries House Republicans have pledged to launch now that they’ve management of the decrease chamber.
Act Daily News has contacted the committee for remark.
In an earlier assertion to Act Daily News, the TSA stated Friday it’s “aware of a potential cybersecurity incident, and we are investigating in coordination with our federal partners.”
The knowledge was sitting on the general public web in an unsecured pc server hosted by CommuteAir, a regional airline based mostly in Ohio, in keeping with the hacker claiming the invention, Act Daily News beforehand reported.
The hacker, who additionally describes herself as a cybersecurity researcher, beforehand instructed Act Daily News she notified CommuteAir of the information publicity.
The regional airline stated in an announcement that the information accessed by the hacker was “an outdated 2019 version of the federal no-fly list” that included names and birthdates.
The no-fly checklist is a set of identified, or suspected, terrorists, who’re barred from flying to or within the US. The screening program grew out of the September 11, 2001, terrorist assaults and entails airways evaluating their passenger data with federal knowledge to maintain harmful individuals off planes.
Act Daily News beforehand reported that CommuteAir, which solely operates 50-seat regional flights for United Airlines from Washington Dulles, Houston and Denver hubs, stated it took the affected pc server offline after a “member of the security research community” had contacted the airline.
The Daily Dot, a tech news outlet, first reported on the supposed knowledge breach.