{"id":11353,"date":"2015-06-22T14:58:13","date_gmt":"2015-06-22T19:58:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/?p=11353"},"modified":"2015-06-22T14:58:13","modified_gmt":"2015-06-22T19:58:13","slug":"apwu-statement-regarding-second-security-breach-at-opm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/2015\/06\/22\/apwu-statement-regarding-second-security-breach-at-opm\/","title":{"rendered":"APWU Statement Regarding Second Security Breach at OPM"},"content":{"rendered":"

Millions More Could Be Affected<\/h4>\n
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APWU – 06\/22\/2015<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>–\u00a0<\/span><\/span>The recent announcement by the\u00a0<\/span>Office of Personnel Management (OPM)<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>of a second major breach of data on \u201ccurrent and former employees of the federal government whose records OPM manages\u201d could affect many APWU members, said Retirees Department Director Judy Beard.<\/p>\n

\u201cOPM manages the records of postal retirees, as well as the records of current and former members of the military, so this could mean you,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

OPM has confirmed that approximately 4 million active, retired and former federal employees were affected by the first breach, which was discovered in April and announced to the public on June 4.<\/p>\n

The agency has not yet estimated the impact of the second breach, which was discovered in May. The second cyber intrusion exposed information contained in background checks (including the highly sensitive SF-86 forms) of \u201ccurrent, former and prospective federal employees and those for whom a federal background investigation was conducted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not Encrypted, Not Notified<\/strong><\/p>\n

At a hearing before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on June 16, OPM Director Katherine Archuleta confirmed that Social Security numbers in OPM\u2019s computer systems remain unencrypted. \u201cThis makes all of those affected by the breach vulnerable to credit fraud,\u201d Beard said.<\/p>\n

OPM also confirmed in a\u00a0<\/span>June 18 update<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>to its website that notification to those affected by the breach were not completed by June 19, the date initially announced by the agency.<\/p>\n

APWU President Mark Dimondstein has requested a meeting with OPM to ascertain the number of current and former members who were affected by the breaches and to ensure that the agency is taking appropriate steps to mitigate the intrusion. \u201cThe APWU is fully committed to protecting the privacy of APWU members, both active and retired,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Credit Monitoring<\/strong><\/p>\n

Consumers are entitled by law to one free credit report per year from each of the three major credit bureaus \u2013 Equifax, Experian, and Trans Union \u2013 Beard pointed out. \u201cWe recommend that you don\u2019t wait for a notification from OPM to examine your credit history.\u00a0 You may order a report from each bureau all at once, however we recommend that you stagger your\u00a0order \u2013request a report from each credit monitoring company\u00a0at a different time,\u201d she said. “Receiving reports periodically throughout the year may give you more comfort of knowing what\u2019s going on with your credit history.”<\/p>\n

You can request your credit report at\u00a0<\/span>www.AnnualCreditReport.com<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>or by calling 1-877-322-8228. Contact information for the credit bureaus can be found on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) website,\u00a0<\/span>www.ftc.gov<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you have received a notice from OPM and are concerned about your credit history, you may place a fraud alert on your credit file to let creditors know to contact you before opening a new account in your name. Simply call TransUnion at 1-800-680-7289 to place this alert. TransUnion will then notify the other two credit bureaus on your behalf.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor those who received notification from OPM, we urge you to follow their instructions by enrolling in the CSID Protector Plus program offered,\u201d Beard said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"1-APWU-New\"<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Millions More Could Be Affected APWU – 06\/22\/2015\u00a0–\u00a0The recent announcement by the\u00a0Office of Personnel Management (OPM)\u00a0of a second major breach of data on \u201ccurrent and former employees of the federal government whose records OPM manages\u201d could affect many APWU members, said Retirees Department Director Judy Beard. \u201cOPM manages the records of postal retirees, as well […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10087,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-apwu-news","last_archivepost"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11353"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11353\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11354,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11353\/revisions\/11354"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}