US Federal Court Court IT Systems Breached

The US Congress has warned the American public that the federal justice system’s public document management system was compromised in a cyber attack. This attack on the US justice system has caused major problems with their public document management system and this was revealed recently at a hearing on oversight of the Justice Department and the dept says it is now investigating this data breach. 

The Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee Jerold Nadler went on record to confirm that three hostile actors had gained access to the Court Electronic Records and Case Management systems. This means that the criminals and hackers may have had access to documents across the US court system.

Nadler said that the document system had suffered from a system security failure, leading to the breach. At the hearing, it was revealed that the breach was first discovered in March, but occurred in early 2020. The breach could affect civil and criminal litigation that is pending.

Head of the Dept. of Justice (DoJ) National Security Division told the committee that the incident was first discovered in March and is a "significant concern," but and added that DoJ  “working very closely with the judicial conference and judges around the country to address the issue.”

Congressional lawmakers demanded answers from the Administrative Office of the US Courts (AOUSC) and Senator Ron Wyden has accused the judiciary of failing to modernize. “I write to express serious concerns that the federal judiciary has hidden from the American public and many members of Congress the serious national security consequences of the courts’ failure to protect sensitive data to which they have been entrusted.” 

A spokesperson for the AOUSC has admitted that “the Judiciary faces a significant threat to our electronic case management system.” He added  that sensitive court documents would now be stored in a “secure stand-alone computer system” and not uploaded to the public document management system.  

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